Abusive Policies


Book Description

In the early 1970s, a new wave of public service announcements urged parents to "help end an American tradition" of child abuse. The message, relayed repeatedly over television and radio, urged abusive parents to seek help. Support groups for parents, including Parents Anonymous, proliferated across the country to deal with the seemingly burgeoning crisis. At the same time, an ever-increasing number of abused children were reported to child welfare agencies, due in part to an expansion of mandatory reporting laws and the creation of reporting hotlines across the nation. Here, Mical Raz examines this history of child abuse policy and charts how it changed since the late 1960s, specifically taking into account the frequency with which agencies removed African American children from their homes and placed them in foster care. Highlighting the rise of Parents Anonymous and connecting their activism to the sexual abuse moral panic that swept the country in the 1980s, Raz argues that these panics and policies—as well as biased viewpoints regarding race, class, and gender—played a powerful role shaping perceptions of child abuse. These perceptions were often directly at odds with the available data and disproportionately targeted poor African American families above others.




Raising Government Children


Book Description

In the 1930s, buoyed by the potential of the New Deal, child welfare reformers hoped to formalize and modernize their methods, partly through professional casework but more importantly through the loving care of temporary, substitute families. Today, however, the foster care system is widely criticized for failing the children and families it is intended to help. How did a vision of dignified services become virtually synonymous with the breakup of poor families and a disparaged form of "welfare" that stigmatizes the women who provide it, the children who receive it, and their families? Tracing the evolution of the modern American foster care system from its inception in the 1930s through the 1970s, Catherine Rymph argues that deeply gendered, domestic ideals, implicit assumptions about the relative value of poor children, and the complex public/private nature of American welfare provision fueled the cultural resistance to funding maternal and parental care. What emerged was a system of public social provision that was actually subsidized by foster families themselves, most of whom were concentrated toward the socioeconomic lower half, much like the children they served. Analyzing the ideas, debates, and policies surrounding foster care and foster parents' relationship to public welfare, Rymph reveals the framework for the building of the foster care system and draws out its implications for today's child support networks.




Supervising Child Protective Services Caseworkers


Book Description

Provides the foundation for supervisory practice in Child Protective Services (CPS). It describes the roles & responsibilities of the CPS supervisor, & provides practice-oriented advice on how to carry out supervisory responsibilities. Designed for CPS supervisors & administrators, but it also may be helpful to child welfare agency staff who provide training for supervisory personnel & to schools of social work as they prepare new social workers for the child welfare field. Also includes a glossary of terms & a bibliography.




Reporting Child Abuse and Neglect in North Carolina


Book Description

Provides a comprehensive explanation of the North Carolina law requiring all citizens to report cases of suspected child abuse, neglect, and dependency. It also describes the states child protective services system. Appendixes include useful sections of the North Carolina Juvenile Code, elements of criminal offenses against children, and relevant telephone numbers.




Respond in Power Guide: a Parent and Caretaker Guide to the Child Protection System


Book Description

As Child Abuse Investigators for over 10 years, Amanda Wallace and Tafarrah Austin have worked tirelessly to protect children from abuse and neglect while simultaneously protecting families from the convoluted Child Protection System. As the "system" became more powerful, their ability to keep families safe reduced. They had had enough. Drawn from a lifetime of frontline work in the field of child welfare, The Respond in Power Guide: A Parent and Caretaker Guide to the Child Protection System is a solution to a problem that has plagued the system for far too long. For the first time ever, parents and caretakers will have the playbook used by child protection workers across the country. By following and implementing the strategies in this guide, your actions will show CPS your child is safe. Your actions will also show your intentions to limit all attempts by CPS to assess your "appropriateness" to parent your child. Your action will show CPS that these are your children and you know the law. Whether you are a mother, father, grandmother, uncle or godmother of a child, the Respond in Power Guide is your go to resource for discovering HOW CPS became so powerful and WHY you should never consent to a power struggle with CPS over your safe children. The Respond in Power Guide helps parents and caretakers of safe children understand the law to ensure their parental rights are protected when engaging with the Child Protection System. By reading this guide and Responding in Power to the Child Protection System, you will be a part of the movement to change the way the Child Protection System is allowed to operate. About the Authors Amanda Wallace received her Bachelor's of Social Work from the University of North Carolina at Greensboro. With a 10-year career as a Child Abuse Investigator, Amanda worked throughout several counties in North Carolina. Watching the rights of families decrease and the power of CPS increase, Amanda realized that she had become the silent enforcer for an oppressive system. It was then that Amanda understood the system and the perceived power given to CPS by society. This insider knowledge will truly help families understand how to STOP CPS. The lack of knowledge of the system makes fear a natural response when families encounter CPS. That same fear fosters compliance with unlawful and unethical CPS policies. This guide is an apology to families on behalf of the system by acknowledging the problem and giving the solution directly to those who need it: "FAMILIES". "You MUST protect YOUR Culture, YOUR Rights, YOUR Families"-Amanda Wallace Tafarrah Austin started off obtaining an Associate degree in Office System Technology, Legal. Tafarrah continued her education by obtaining a Bachelor of Arts degree in Sociology with a minor in Criminal Justice. If that wasn't enough, Tafarrah pursued her Master's in Criminal Justice and Public Administration. Tafarrah, would later pursue a Certificate in Substance Abuse Counseling. With the knowledge obtained Tafarrah secured a position as a Child Abuse Investigator in Child Welfare. The passion was there, the spark was there, and the need for protecting children was there. As time passed, the vision became clearer and clearer. Working day in and day out in a "system" for well over 10 years, The Blinders were removed. Tafarrah developed a desire to help families understand the "system" which ultimately wasn't designed to help families involved in the Child Protection System. When interacting with families Tafarrah was constantly reminded that to help families grab the ropes in this oppressive system she needed to help families understand how to STOP CPS. "We can either be part of the PROBLEM or part of the SOLUTION....You Choose, I Did"




Kids Count Data Book


Book Description




System Kids


Book Description

System Kids considers the daily lives of adolescent mothers as they negotiate the child welfare system to meet the needs of their children and themselves. Often categorized as dependent and delinquent, these young women routinely become wards of the state as they move across the legal and social borders of a fragmented urban bureaucracy. Combining critical policy study and ethnography, and drawing on current scholarship as well as her own experience as a welfare program manager, Lauren Silver demonstrates how social welfare "silos" construct the lives of youth as disconnected, reinforcing unforgiving policies and imposing demands on women the system was intended to help. As clients of a supervised independent living program, they are expected to make the transition into independent adulthood, but Silver finds a vast divide between these expectations and the young women's lived reality. Digging beneath the bureaucratic layers of urban America and bringing to light the daily experiences of young mothers and the caseworkers who assist them, System Kids illuminates the ignored work and personal ingenuity of clients and caseworkers alike. Ultimately reflecting on how her own understanding of the young women has changed in the years since she worked in the same social welfare program that is the focus of the book, Silver emphasizes the importance of empathy in research and in the formation of welfare policies.




Child Welfare in North Carolina


Book Description




Improving Outcomes for Children and Families


Book Description

This edited collection offers an international perspective on the challenges of designing and undertaking outcome-based evaluation of child and family services. It introduces the key ideas and issues currently being debated in the evaluation of these services and provides examples of evaluation from policy and practice.




The Children's Bureau Legacy


Book Description

Comprehensive history of the Children’s Bureau from 1912-2012 in eBook form that shares the legacy of this landmark agency that established the first Federal Government programs, research and social reform initiatives aimed to improve the safety, permanency and well-being of children, youth and families. In addition to bios of agency heads and review of legislation and publications, this important book provides a critical look at the evolution of the Nation and its treatment of children as it covers often inspiring and sometimes heart-wrenching topics such as: child labor; the Orphan Trains, adoption and foster care; infant and maternal mortality and childhood diseases; parenting, infant and child care education; the role of women's clubs and reformers; child welfare standards; Aid to Dependent Children; Depression relief; children of migrants and minorities (African Americans, Hispanics, Native Americans), including Indian Boarding Schools and Indian Adoption Program; disabled children care; children in wartime including support of military families and World War II refugee children; Juvenile delinquency; early childhood education Head Start; family planning; child abuse and neglect; natural disaster recovery; and much more. Child welfare and related professionals, legislators, educators, researchers and advocates, university school of social work faculty and staff, libraries, and others interested in social work related to children, youth and families, particularly topics such as preventing child abuse and neglect, foster care, and adoption will be interested in this comprehensive history of the Children's Bureau that has been funded by the U.S. Federal Government since 1912.