A Systematic Review of the Literature Regarding Family Context and Mental Health of Children From Rural Methamphetamine-Involved Families: Implications for Rural Child Welfare Practice

This review of the literature aims to guide practitioners concerned with ameliorating the psychosocial effects for rural-dwelling children from homes where methamphetamine is used or produced. Although a substantial body of research exists regarding the environmental dangers and physical health risks to children from methamphetamine-affected homes, there is a paucity of research regarding child psychosocial outcomes. This article summarizes the published literature examining family contexts and psychological and behavioral consequences for children. Implications of this body of knowledge for child welfare practitioners, limitations of the studies reviewed, and future research directions are discussed.     

A case study in public child welfare: county-level practices that address racial disparity in foster care placement

Racial disproportionality has been a longstanding issue within child welfare. The continued overrepresentation of black children in the foster care system is troubling. The authors of this article conducted a case study of two counties in New York State that have steadily decreased the number of black children in foster care in an effort to identify what aspects of their child welfare practice impacted the decline. The case study employed document analysis, in-depth interviews, and focus groups with child removal decision makers. Utilizing a grounded theory approach to content organization and analysis, several themes emerged as noticeable factors. Some of the most salient themes included preventive services and resources, community collaborations, case practice development, family meetings, workforce diversity, the court system, and, the most unique, blind removal meetings. The themes found in this study present promising practices to assist in decreasing the racial disparity in child welfare removal decisions.     

Caregiver engagement in the behavioral health screening and assessment for child welfare-involved children: child welfare and behavioral health workers’ perspectives

Caregivers are frequent sources of information of their children’s behavioral health and other service needs. It is particularly challenging to engage child welfare-involved caregivers who risk losing custody of their children. This case study explores how caregivers who were about to lose custody of their children engage in their children’s behavioral health screening and assessment from the perspective of child welfare and behavioral health workers. Using qualitative data collected via focus groups from child welfare and behavioral health workers, themes were identified related to the process of engaging caregivers in child behavioral health screening and assessment, determinants (both internal and external) for the caregiver engagement process, and how this process affected screening and assessment outcomes. Findings have implications for screening and assessing behavioral health needs of children involved with the child welfare system and recommended strategies to better engage caregivers in the process.     

An effective pedagogy for child welfare education

ABSTRACT

Preparing social workers for child welfare practice with the complexly traumatized children now in the system has created the need for schools of social work to integrate trauma content into the curriculum. This article presents findings of an evaluation of a child welfare course designed to prepare MSW level trauma-informed child welfare practitioners. Findings indicate that students in 29 schools of social work not only significantly increased their confidence in working with traumatized children and families but also are significantly more prepared to work toward these three child welfare goals of safety, permanency, and well-being.     

Early Care and Education for Children in the Child Welfare System: Evaluations of Two Training Programs

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.     

Educational Services for Children in Foster Care

ABSTRACT

Most literature on the education of foster youth focuses on their individual outcomes and characteristics. A small body of literature documents a lack of collaboration between the child welfare and education systems. This study explores commonalities and differences in perspectives between child welfare and education system stakeholders. It draws on findings from a multi-county exploratory study on educational services for foster youth. The findings in this study identify several systemic barriers including placement instability within the child welfare system, limited financial resources of schools, and poor inter-agency communication. In addition, differences in the perceptions of school and child welfare agency personnel regarding the needs of foster children in school, problems encountered in enrolling children in school, and the role and motives of each agency in addressing these needs and problems are identified. These differences point to both the challenges involved in improving communications and collaboration between the two systems, as well as the opportunities to improve educational services to children in foster care.     

What Happened?

ABSTRACT

This article presents an overview and historical analysis of child welfare from its inception in the 19th century through the Social Security Act of 1935 and into the present. An argument is made that the historical de-professionalization of child welfare is reflected in changing societal values and resultant legislation framing investments in child welfare, as well as the influence of child welfare on the quality of services to children and families. De-professionalization has resulted in lowering the professional credentials of child welfare staff, increasing levels of employee turnover, the formulation of questionable policies, all affecting the quality of services to children and families. Implications of the findings for the re-professionalization of child welfare and for policy and practice are discussed.     

Development of a Quality Assurance and Continuous Quality Improvement (CQI) Model in Public Child Welfare Systems

The purpose of this article is to review the development and implementation of a revised quality assurance and continuous quality improvement (CQI) model for the child welfare system in one Mid-Atlantic state, and the contribution of this new process to measuring the quality of child welfare practices. This revised CQI model in the state includes a broader scope of assessing practice and outcomes, as well as compliance, and engages internal and external partners in the process. This study is the first to describe the state’s revised CQI implementation process and examine preliminary outcomes in a statewide child welfare system. Findings indicate that the revised model was able to identify the factors that contributed to improving outcomes for children and families and to develop a greater understanding of the aggregate data across the state. This study will contribute to the comprehensive understanding of the model and provide implications for future quality assurance practices.     

Improving Father Involvement in Child Welfare Practice and Research: Conceptual Considerations from the Social Science Literature

The positive benefits to children of their fathers' involvement in their lives have been well documented in the social science literature. This article reviews related child welfare literature and argues that several important concepts informing father involvement research in the social sciences—the significance of the parents' relationship, the potentially dangerous behaviors of fathers, and emerging trends in low-income families—need to be incorporated into work on father involvement in the child welfare context, in order to maximize the effectiveness of involvement efforts as well as the potential benefits to children. Implications for child welfare practice include the need for intensive involvement efforts, attention to fathers' progress in treatment, services to strengthen parental relationships and improve coparenting, and expansion of service eligibility to all those who play parental roles in children's lives. Implications for research include the need for studies examining the different kinds of fathers in child welfare households, how parental dynamics influence child and parent outcomes, and the influence fathers' problems may have in moderating the effects of their involvement on children.     

Family Group Conferencing: An Indigenous Practice Approach to Compliance With the Indian Child Welfare Act

Native American children are perpetually over-represented in the U.S. child welfare system, despite the creation of the Indian Child Welfare Act. This article examines the use of family group conferencing, particularly initiated in Indian child welfare systems, as a practice method to reduce the disproportionality in this area.     

Racial Disparities in Service Referrals for Families in the Child Welfare System

Among families in the child welfare system, family reunification depends largely upon the services to which families are referred. This study examines whether race/ethnicity influences the number and types of services to which families are referred. Findings suggest that compared to African American families, Hispanic families were more often referred to psychosocial services (e.g., mental health) than basic needs (e.g., housing). These findings indicate a need to reduce service referral disparities between ethnic groups.     

Exploring Child Welfare Workers’ Experiences with Neglect Cases: A Qualitative Study

Child neglect continues to be a pressing concern in American society. However, child neglect is often found to be more difficult to assess than other forms of child maltreatment. This study explores how child welfare workers experience their day-to-day work with children and families, when neglect is the presenting concern. Convenience sampling was used to recruit former and current child welfare workers (N = 20). Three focus groups were conducted. The analyses identified four themes inherent in case workers' experiences in neglect cases: a dirty house isn't just a dirty house, dilemmas and professional judgment, different values, and ambivalence: compassion and frustration. Implications for practice and future research are discussed.     

An Examination of Oversight and Review in the Child Welfare System

Abstract

Child welfare agencies are accountable to the community not only because they spend public dollars, but also, most critically, because they are charged with protecting vulnerable children. Over the past three decades multiple oversight processes have been initiated as part of an effort to improve accountability in public child welfare. In agencies around the country an array of advocates and monitors regularly review the performance of individual caseworkers. While caseloads grow in number and complexity the ranks of the workforce have not kept pace. The result is too many people watching too few workers serve too many vulnerable children and families.

This paper examines the cumulative effect of five groups of “watchers” that oversee child welfare services. It suggests that every group of watchers should be able to demonstrate that their activities contribute directly to the achievement of system goals.     

How HIV-Positive Aboriginal Women (PAW) Talk About Their Mothering Experiences With Child and Family Services in Ontario

Aboriginal families are disproportionately involved with Children's Aid Societies (or CAS), which is of concern given the history of colonization, assimilation, and child welfare policies that fail to recognize Indigenous practices within Canada. There is no historical data regarding HIV-positive Aboriginal women's (PAW) experiences and interactions with the child welfare system, despite a high degree of HIV-related stigma and discrimination by CAS staff coupled with lack of HIV knowledge and sensitivity to provide culturally appropriate care to PAW and their children. This article is relevant to local and international child welfare practices, and specifically to CAS agencies across Ontario.     

Psychotropic Medications for Youth in Child Welfare: Developing and Pilot-Testing A Field Guide for Team Decision-Making

High rates of children involved with the child welfare system are prescribed psychotropics. In response, federal legislation has mandated state child welfare agencies to develop policies to improve the coordination and oversight around the use of psychotropics. This project aimed to support such policies by developing and pilot-testing a field guide for team discussions and decision-making related to the use of psychotropics among youth in child welfare. We used a community-based participatory research (CBPR) framework to engage a team of local stakeholders, including former youth in foster care and parents, in the research. We developed a field guide to facilitate team discussions and decisions around the individual needs and preferences of youth and families, and we pilot-tested the field guide with child welfare staff, parents, and care team members in seven team meetings. Parents and care team members, in particular, highly valued the guide and found it useful to increase knowledge and improve practices such as side effect monitoring and information sharing. Child welfare responses were more mixed, and some reported feeling burdened by the additional tasks. More work is needed to integrate the guide into routine child welfare practice and reduce burden on staff.     

The adoption of children from out-of-home care: how decision-makers explain the low rates of adoption in Victoria,Australia

The adoption of children from out-of-home care is uncommon in Australia and rarely occurs in the state of Victoria. This paper reports on how professionals involved in making decisions about the permanent placement of children explain the current rates of adoption from out-of-home care in Victoria. Interviews were conducted with eight child welfare specialists, eight adoption and permanent care specialists and five judicial officers. The current low rates of adoption were attributed to the effect of current legislation, the impact of past adoption practices and the establishment of a culture in Victoria in which adoption is now rarely considered an option for children in out-of-home care.     

Issues Surrounding Post-Adoption Contact in Foster Adoption: The Perspective of Foster-to-Adopt Families and Child Welfare Workers

Current research on open adoption gives less consideration to issues surrounding post-adoption contact with birth parents for children adopted from care. Yet, it is widely recognized that the profile of the children and their birth parents, as well as the quality of post-adoption contacts, vary considerably depending on the context in which the adoption takes place. This article is based on interviews with 32 child welfare workers and 16 foster-to-adopt families. It focuses specifically on aspects and conditions that should be taken into consideration when determining whether or how contact between the adopted child and the birth family should be maintained. Our results show that there are distinctive challenges and dilemmas for open adoption in situations where the adopted child comes from a maltreating family, under the responsibility of child welfare services.     

Exploratory Factor Analysis and Reliability of the Child Welfare Trauma-Informed Individual Assessment Tool

This article presents the development and psychometric analysis of the Child Welfare Trauma-Informed Individual Assessment Tool, an instrument designed to measure the extent to which child welfare service providers employ trauma-informed practices with the children and families that they serve. Using the responses of 213 front-line child welfare workers, exploratory factor analysis was used on a seventeen-item scale, resulting in a four-factor model. Based on the results of this analysis, implications for potential uses of the instrument are discussed, and specifications for additional evaluation of the measure's validity are outlined.     

Development and Initial Findings of an Implementation Process Measure for Child Welfare System Change

This article describes a new measure designed to examine the process of implementation of child welfare systems change. The measure was developed to document the status of the interventions and strategies that are being implemented and the drivers that are being installed to achieve sustainable changes in systems. The measure was used in a Children's Bureau-supported national effort to assess the ongoing implementation of 24 systems-change projects in child welfare jurisdictions across the country. The article describes the process for measure development, method of administration and data collection, and quantitative and qualitative findings.     

Secondary traumatic stress and vicarious traumatization in child welfare professionals in Serbia

Child welfare professionals in diverse positions are exposed to a variety of traumatic events including family violence and child abuse and neglect. This secondary exposure puts child welfare workers at the risk of experiencing Secondary Traumatic Stress (STS) and Vicarious Traumatization (VT). For the first time in Serbia, this study quantitatively investigates whether STS and VT are present in child welfare professionals employed in the social welfare centers, foster care and adoption agencies, residential care programs, and shelters for children and youth. It attempts to identify whether the type of service, time exposure to clients, and supervision function as risk or protective factors for negative outcomes. A convenience sample comprised of 135 child welfare professionals completed a series of self-reported measures. Findings indicate that VT and STS are present in this population. Differences in the presence of STS and VT were found according to the types of services offered and length of exposure. Contrary to expectations, supervision was not a protective factor with regards to STS and VT in this population.