Child welfare casework constitutes an emotionally intensive field with a high caseload. The attrition rate among caseworkers within the United States has been a longstanding issue, with national estimates suggesting an average turnover rate of approximately 30% (Casey Family Programs, 2023). Elevated turnover rates not only compromise the operational stability of child welfare agencies but also undermine the quality and consistency of essential services provided to children and families (Casey Family Programs, 2023; Edwards & Wildeman, 2018). In early 2020, the COVID-19 pandemic compelled both public and private sector organizations across the United States to shutter their offices, prioritizing the health and safety of workers and the broader community. This sudden transition posed significant challenges for direct service providers, particularly in education and child welfare. Child welfare agencies, which wrestle with an average of 4.3 million referrals related to abuse and neglect annually (Sciamanna, 2020), faced an array of unprecedented obstacles during the COVID-19 pandemic. Core functions such as home visits and safety assessments were disrupted, as both clients and human services providers reported heightened stressors and difficulties in carrying out these essential duties. (Barello et al.,2020b; Lawson et al.,2020).These escalating workplace stressors have been linked to a decline in employees' organizational commitment and retention (Griffiths et al., 2020; Johnco et al., 2014). It is essential to delineate the specific stressors that have intensified during the pandemic and to examine a potential association with turnover intentions. Such insights could inform targeted policy interventions to reduce turnover rates, thereby stabilizing the workforce and strengthening child welfare services' capacity to effectively support populations that are vulnerable.
The e child protection systems in Germany and Canada are discussed in this article. Both countries have developed child protection frameworks aimed at ensuring children's well-being. The specific details of these frameworks are shaped by the countries' respective historical and societal contexts. Th e article examines how legal frameworks ensure the protection of children and youth and highlights the differences in approach. Particular attention will be paid to analyzing the different protection structures in Germany and Canada, taking into account how historical, cultural, and legal contexts shape child protection mechanisms in each country.
The North Carolina Regional Abuse and Medical Specialist (RAMS) program is the first proactive supervisory consulta-tion program prioritizing child safety and improved interdis-ciplinary communication. Th is study describes the program and staff experiences. From July 1, 2023, to June 30, 2024, RAMS completed 930 consultations pri-marily involving young children, injuries, and reports from medi-cal professionals. Staff increased their knowledge of child abuseevaluations and collaborating with medical professionals, despite challenges like county inconsistencies and concern for state oversight, showing promise as a state-level case consultation program.
Youth aff ected by parental sep-aration, homelessness, or unac-companied minor status are at risk for complex trauma. This study evaluates trauma-informed, arts-based programming for 214 youth, examining changes in self-concept and agency using latent change modeling. Results show that the program promotes psychological protective factors, especially for youth who felt emotionally and physically safe. Findings support the value of trauma-informed arts programs in pro-moting resilience and healing among youth facing adversity.
This study analyzes the relationship between hostile attribution bias and peer acceptance among 41 adolescents (18 girls ages 10-16) in residential care. Results showed that the more accepted adolescents are, the less likely they will be to respond aggressively to behavior of ambiguous intent. No relationship was found between the aggressiveness of the response and the intentionality attributed in accidental scenarios. Interventions aimed at reducing aggressive responses to behavior of ambiguous intent by targeting adolescents' interpretation of social cues are recommended.
The Parents Empowering Parents (PEP) Initiative was launched by New York City's Administration for Children's Services in partnership with-Rises parent-led advocacy organization, and two foster care agencies, PEP integrated parent advocates-parents with lived experience into foster care units to support families toward reunification. This study explored PEP's role in fostering family-centered practices and culture change, highlighting its co-design process; collaborative approach; and individualized, trauma-informed support as pathways to improved child welfare outcomes and systemic transformation.
This paper describes the process by which the New Jersey Department of Children and Families (DCF) and its Youth Council-a body of youth with lived experience in the child welfare system-conceptualized, developed, and evaluated a peer mentoring program, EnlightenMENT. Additionally, through in-depth interviews with peer mentors themselves, themes emerged highlighting the experiences of peer mentors working in EnlightenMENT: (a) motivations for mentoring, (b) perceived benefits of mentoring, and (c) perceived challenges of mentoring.
This article reports preliminary findings from the Principles to Outcome-driven Practice demonstration project assessing the feasibility, usability, and replicability of a family-/child-/ youth-engaged Theory of Change framework for co-designing and evaluating equality improvement efforts in residential interventions. Results from the first year of this two-year demonstration project indicate the framework's potential to transform residential intervention research and program evaluation by meaningfully integrating youth and family team members into learning collaboratives and efforts to build quality improvement capacity.
Authentic partnership between child welfare system leaders and individuals with lived expertise is essential to building family-driven systems of support, but models of engagement vary. This study applies a participatory action research approach groundedin principles of practice-based evidence and emergent design to identify the core components of a successful model of engaging lived experts in child welfare and prevention system design. Applied together, these components (i.e., cohort structure, accountability mechanisms, equitable compensation, shared and deferred power, and low-barrier entry) supported productive collaborations with system leaders and lived experts to co-design new systems of family support.
This article highlights studies of foster care during the 1980s, 1990s, and 2000s that involved people with lived experience, including foster care alumni, foster parents, and birth parents. What made these research findings more valid and powerful was the involvement of foster care alumni and foster parents in designing those studies, interpreting the findings, and co-presenting results to policy-makers, child welfare administrators, and mental health agency leaders.This article will describe these early phases of engagement with lived experts and what supports it required.
Youth firesetting behavior is highly dangerous, causes millions of dollars of damage annually, and, in child welfare, creates significant challenges in finding placement. The current study compared characteristics between youth with and without firesetting behaviors in a child welfare congregate care facility. Findings suggest that ADHD diagnosis was significantly associated with firesetting behavior. This suggests that assessing/ treating ADHD in youth in child welfare is important for reducing firesetting risk and improving outcomes for these youth.
This article explores the complex experiences of adopted people who identify as LGBTQ+, highlighting the intersectionality of their identities and the impact on their mental health, well-being, and identity development. It emphasizes the need for inclusive and culturally competent support systems, policies, and research to promote resilience and affirm their diverse identities.
This paper refl ects the narratives of families receiving a monthly unconditional cash transfer in addition to targeted child pro-tection services. Using a partici-patory monitoring and evaluation method, the program recorded how the participating families defi ned domains of child and fam-ily well-being. After 15 months, the families reported experienc-ing lower stress, providing more nutritious meals, and spending more time with children, and gave specifi c examples of using what they had learned in the program about more eff ective parenting.
