Child Welfare Reform: The Role of Federal Court Oversight in Child Protective Service Workers' Caseloads

Team Decisionmaking (TDM) involves a meeting of community representatives, family members, and social workers who review every decision to remove children from their parents or change of placement, including reunification or adoption. Even when the leadership of child welfare organizations mandates the use of TDM, implementing TDM is very challenging. To understand these challenges, a research team visited five diverse communities and conducted 74 focus groups and interviews involving 180 administrators, caseworkers, community partners, supervisors, and TDM facilitators. This article reviews the findings of this TDM study through previous research on street-level bureaucracy and technology transfer. The results suggest successful TDM implementation requires attention to the discretion of street-level caseworkers and the organizational constraints they face.

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ROLE OF THE CHILD PROTECTIVE ORGANIZATION

PEDIATRICS ◽

10.1542/peds.51.4.793 ◽

1973 ◽

Vol 51 (4) ◽

pp. 793-795

Author(s):

James S. Cameron

Keyword(s):

New York ◽

Child Welfare ◽

Social Services ◽

New York State ◽

York State Department ◽

Protective Services ◽

Protective Service ◽

Child Welfare League ◽

Abused And Neglected Children

A Review of recent literature and press pronouncements has no doubt left many confused about what degree of concern should be channeled into the problem of the abused child. Part of the confusion results from a tendency to resort to the numbers game in trying to highlight the critical child welfare problems that face this nation, state, and city. Rather than wonder which numbers to believe, or whether physical and emotional battering of children is increasing, I think that the abuse and neglect of children in New York City is of such significant proportions as to justify our dedicated concern. For some years there has been a specialized approach to the problems of the neglected and abused child. This specialized approach has been termed child protective services. It has been developed in response to the problems of abused and neglected children, which the community feels must be looked into and treated. The Child Welfare League defines protective service as "A specialized child welfare service which carries a delegated responsibility to offer help on behalf of any child considered or found to be neglected." The New York State Department of Social Services defines protective services as "Those provided to children living in their own homes who are seriously neglected, abused, or subjected to demoralizing circumstances by their parents or others responsible for their care." Child protective service is not a new service. It has a very illustrious history that really started in this city, back in the late 1800s, through the development of the Society for the Prevention of the Cruelty to Children.

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Child Welfare Reform: Will Recent Changes Make At-Risk Children Safer?

Issues for Debate in Social Policy: Selections from CQ Researcher ◽

10.4135/9781483349220.n11 ◽

2014 ◽

pp. 251-274

Author(s):

Tom Price

Keyword(s):

At Risk ◽

Child Welfare ◽

Welfare Reform ◽

At Risk Children ◽

Child Welfare Reform

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Reforming a System That Cannot Reform Itself: Child Welfare Reform by Class Action Lawsuits

Social Work ◽

10.1093/sw/swz029 ◽

2019 ◽

Vol 64 (4) ◽

pp. 283-291

Author(s):

Joyce Y Lee ◽

Terri Gilbert ◽

Shawna J Lee ◽

Karen M Staller

Keyword(s):

Child Welfare ◽

Welfare Reform ◽

Social Workers ◽

The United States ◽

Social Work Practice ◽

Class Action ◽

Systematic Change ◽

Class Action Lawsuits ◽

Child Welfare Reform ◽

Consent Decrees

Abstract Class action lawsuits have become an increasingly common way to facilitate institutional reform. The purpose of this article is to provide an introduction to social workers of child welfare reform by class action lawsuits and subsequent consent decrees. The authors provide an overview of class action lawsuits, with a focus on their role in implementing systematic change in the United States. They highlight consent decrees as a means of settling class action lawsuits. They illustrate the current state of the child welfare system and how child advocacy groups have used class action lawsuits to initiate reform. Authors provide two case examples of child welfare reform by consent decree and engage in comparative analysis to investigate similarities and differences in the two cases. Finally, they note implications for social work practice and education and provide recommendations to equip and train social workers involved in child welfare services.

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