Dan Torres was traveling the country, working with state and regional agencies that were trying to improve outcomes for families involved in their child welfare systems. As an associate at the Center for the Study of Social Policy, his area of expertise was family support. While agencies and community groups were exerting incredible effort and changing the game for some, he couldn’t escape one question: How do we work more on preventing families from becoming involved in child welfare systems?

He came to Washington state in 2012 to do just that, and this summer he was named executive director of Essentials for Childhood. Essentials is a collective impact effort, and its vision is that all children in Washington thrive in safe, stable and nurturing relationships and environments.

“Washington is unique and fortunate to have a wealth of systems change efforts in place,” Torres says. “We haven’t fully taken advantage of that yet as a state, and I’m hoping Essentials for Childhood can play a role in connecting the dots and really leveraging some very strong local work.”

A California native, Torres first came to Washington for graduate school, and worked for Casey Family Programs for a time before moving to New York to work for the Center for the Study of Social Policy. He returned to Washington – as a new dad – to direct policy and partnerships work at the early learning organization Thrive Washington. He took the Essentials job in July.

“I’ve had a lot of opportunities to bring diverse perspectives together around collective action so I’m leaning on that in this role,” Torres says. “What I’ve learned from working at the national, state and local levels with government agencies and cross-sector community partners is that transparent, collaborative leadership is the best way to advance our goals.” 

Torres has an opportunity to demonstrate those values with Essentials for Childhood, which is governed by a steering committee of leaders in social services, philanthropy and community engagement and includes two workgroups: one focused on systems innovations and the other on community education and action. It is supported by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation. The CDC set up the Essentials for Childhood framework to support communities committed to the positive development of children and families, and specifically to the prevention of child abuse and neglect.

Torres says there are lots of opportunities for collective action for the Washington initiative, including: coordinating more closely by using common indicators to measure success; engaging families with information about optimal child development; and establishing a truly statewide effort to spread trauma-informed approaches.

In the next year, Essentials is especially well-positioned, he says, to build awareness about the importance of investing in high-quality home visiting, and to unpack how Washington can utilize Help Me Grow at the local and state levels.

The numerous opportunities to collaborate in Washington is both a benefit and a barrier, Torres says, because partners are stretched thin by navigating the complexity.

“I want to create multiple opportunities to engage and inform the initiative,” Torres says. “There are so many strong leaders with deep content expertise, and the challenge is fully taking advantage of that as a collective.” 

To learn more about Essentials for Childhood or join the mailing list, contact Dan Torres at dan.torres@doh.wa.gov. For Washington state residents, there are multiple ways to engage, including joining a workgroup or spreading the word about the value of programs and services that benefit families.