Early Care and Education for Children in the Child Welfare System: Evaluations of Two Training Programs |
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| Authors: | Sacha M Klein Mary Kay Falconer Stephanie M Benson |
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| Institution: | 1. Michigan State University, School of Social Work, East Lansing, MI, USA;2. Research, Evaluation and Systems Unit, Ounce of Prevention Fund of Florida, Tallahassee, FL, USA;3. Department of Social Welfare, University of California, Los Angeles, CA, USA |
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| Abstract: | Despite evidence that early care and education services benefit at-risk children, they remain underutilized by families in the child welfare system. This article describes two training programs developed to educate child welfare and childcare/preschool staff about the importance of early care and education for maltreated children and how to access these services. A combined total of 274 trainees completed knowledge tests about this topic and significant pre- to post-training improvements indicate that both training programs effectively increased participants' knowledge about this important topic. In addition, improvement in self-assessed competency was observed for participants in one program, and positive changes in attitudes and anticipated practice behavior regarding childcare for foster children were observed among participants in the other. |
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| Keywords: | Childcare child welfare early care and education preschool training workforce development |
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