Blog

An article called "Is child protective services effective?" in this month's Children and Youth Services Review finds that CPS involvement does not reduce the risk of further substantiated maltreatment. It highlights both the need to improve interventions and questions current mandates that are not garnering results. As the article explains, one possible reason interventions may be less effective is that most CPS cases are opened for neglect, not abuse, and most services are aimed at...

https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0190740917305285?via%3Dihub This study examines how Child Protection Services (CPS) – involved parents and professionals describe coping with moral injury through resources available within their everyday lives. Moral injury refers to the lasting harm caused by one's own or another's actions in high-stakes situations that transgress deeply held moral beliefs and expectations. This harm can occur at multiple, interacting psychological, social...

https://www.grandparentsplus.org.uk/Handlers/Download.ashx?IDMF=75a6b874-6666-4224-8770-48905670dbaf The Kinship Care: State of the Nation Survey This report is based on a survey of members of the Grandparents Plus Kinship Care Support Network, which includes almost 4,000 kinship carers. The results are based on responses from 671 kinship carers living in England and Wales, making it the largest ever survey of its kind. Carried out in February 2017 using both online and postal...

Aprel Phelps Downey What was your ACEs Aha moment? When did you first hear about ACEs and what impact did/does it have on you? How do ACEs impact you as a parent? How is your parenting impacted by past trauma? What’s been most helpful to you as a parent parenting with ACEs? What’s been most challenging for you as a parent parenting with ACEs? What has parenting taught you? What have you learned? How do you manage complex family relationships? What inspires/encourages and helps you? I know...

Pediatrician Nadine Burke Harris is a masterful storyteller. I learned in a conversation with her at Wheelock College before her presentation for the Brookline, MA organization Steps to Success , that before she decided to become doctor, Dr. Burke Harris wanted to be an author. Only after the smashing success of her TED talk: How childhood trauma affects health across a lifetime , when she was approached by a literary agent, did she find her way to writing. Her newly released book The...

The past few years have brought a wealth of evidence for the impact of childhood trauma on lifelong health. The AAP has recognized the importance of childhood trauma with conferences (2015 Violence, Abuse and Toxic Stress: An Update on Trauma-informed Care in Children and Youth) and resources ( AAP Trauma Toolbox for Primary Care .) Like many pediatricians, I have been grateful for the attention to and evidence base for an area of pediatrics I see on a daily basis but for which I have felt...

I’ve just caught up with an excellent 2014 story from ProPublica on how child welfare systems deal with parents who have mental illnesses. The story looked at two cases in which parents really did have some sort of mental illness (putting them in the same company as an estimated 43.8 million Americans in any given year). That sets the point of the story apart from another major problem in child welfare — quick-and-dirty “psych evals” that mislabel parents mentally ill largely because they...

Fostering Change: Alliance for NH Foster Parents has been fielding concerns from foster parents since its inception three months ago. The influx of stories surfacing from concerned foster parents indicates that the Division of Children, Youth and Families (DCYF) in New Hampshire is needlessly inflicting trauma on the state’s most vulnerable population by abruptly and unnecessarily moving them to new placements. New Hampshire’s foster parents and concerned citizens are advocating for foster...

Anthropologist Tina Lee immersed herself in the exotic culture of a child welfare agency, its folkways, “clients,” employees and contractors. She has returned with an eye-opening report. Anthropologists describe, not prescribe. Their expeditions yield close-up views of the rituals and radically different practices of far-away societies. With their help, we can reflect: Would we like to live like the Melanesians? How about the hunter-gatherer lifestyle? The tribes that Professor Lee studied...

Interested young people can learn more on the website: All-Star Internship Overview The deadline to apply is February 20th. Eligibility Requirements: 18 to 24 years old at the beginning of the internship Experienced foster care in the United States Permission to travel and a government-issued photo ID Spread the Word!

A study published by The National Academies of Sciences in 2016 resulting in 10 Recommendations to build support for parents... "Over the past several decades, researchers have identified parenting- related knowledge, attitudes, and practices that are associated with improved developmental outcomes for children and around which parenting- related programs, policies, and messaging initiatives can be designed. However, consensus is lacking on the elements of parenting that are most important...

Foster youth in California schools have a rate of chronic absenteeism far higher than the general student population, according to data available for the first time from the state’s Department of Education (DOE). Statewide, the rate of chronic absenteeism — or when a student is absent from school for any reason for more than 10 percent of the days they were enrolled in a school — is just under 11 percent. When it comes to foster children in California schools, 25 percent are considered...