Child Welfare
• Well-being of children
– Broad sense
– Special needs
• When parents are incapable or unwilling
• Discrepancy b/w expectation & performance
• What are threats to children?
Child safety & a police state
Problems of role functioning
• Unoccupied
• Incapacity
• Rejection
• Intrarole conflict
• Interrole conflict
• Child incapacity
• Deficiency of community resources
4 reqs of child maltreatment
Definable directed behavior (commission or
omission)
Demonstrable harm
Link b/w behavior & harm
Maltreatment is serious enough to warrant
intervention
How often?
• Only reported (incidence)abuse is counted
(way conservative)
• Lack of uniform definition
• People reticent to report
• May never know
• Estimates ‟04 3 million referrals
– 39 referrals per 1,00 kids
– 872,00 substantiated, 900,00 follow-up
Types,who, etc
50.00%
40.00%
30.00%
20.00%
10.00%
0.00%
Sexual medical emotion other physical neglect
Series1 9.00% 2% 6% 22.00% 17.00% 44.00%
Subsequent referrals most likely for neglect-
underlying condition
More characteristics
• Gender is evenly split
• Occurs in all classes
– More common lower SES
– ½ half of removals TANF families
– Bias of reporting (1/3 substantiated of those ½ serious
injury)
• Folks of color (24% pop, 44% abuse reports)
• Age is even (younger the child,more serious)
• Increase in reporting (294% ‟76-‟90)
– Acceptability & mechanism of reporting
• 12-31% all children & 9-54% adult women sex
abused as children
Conditions
• Personality traits & social attributes
– Low self esteem, social isolation, rigid personalities
• Mental Health issues
– Psychopatholoy, depression, psychosis, mental
retardation, substance
• Family factors
– Parental collusion, scapegoating, single parent status,
adolescent parents, no extended family
• Stress from the environment
– Chronic, situational, & precipitating
• Culture of violence
– Ambivalence
– Subculture
History
• Short childhood-worked in the fields not treated
distinctively-mini adults
• Church & extended family supports devastated by
industrialization
• mid 19th century useful to useless child
• Children‟s institutions answer to poorhouses
– 1800-3, 1851-77, 1860-124
– Ed & apprentice
• Foster family-placing children in family farms
– 1870 3,00 per year
– Placement capricious & no follow-up
Protective services SPCA-
American Humane Society SPCC
• Mary Ellen Wilson- abused by step-parents, Henry
Bergh & Eldridge Gerry, attorney sought custody
1875
• 1900‟s protective services, foster home &
government auspices
• Resurgence of child protection 1960
– Kempe sought to expose physician “repugnance &
difficult w/ objectively approaching parents”
– Obscure bruising & spontaneous hematoma
• Model practices for protective services ‟62
Children‟s bureau
• ‟67 all states had laws for mandatory reporting
• Title XX mandatory protective services
Recent Developments
• Adrift in foster care, neglect of biological
family
• Permanency planning- early id, work w/
parents, removal on guidelines, all
placement alternatives, time-limited plan,
guidelines for termination, resources
Family Preservation
• Remain in homes
• Maintain family strengths
• Stabilize crisis
• Increase skills & competency
• Formal & informal helping resources
– Small caseloads, concrete services, short term 4-6
weeks to 3-4 months
• Research
– Did not impact placements, not delivering concrete
services, continuum of services
Adoption & Safe Families Act
• Reasonable efforts to preserve family, unless
extenuating circumstances
• Hearing in 30 days to develop permanency plan
• Increased $ ($275 mil ‟99-$305 mil „‟01)
• Class Action lawsuits
– Not implementing services‟
– Children recognized as class
• Federal lawsuits, relief from system, monetary rewards,
• Separation of duties investigation & ongoing
treatment
Perspectives
• Discipline
• Causation of Maltreatment
• Rights of Children & Parents
Services & Roles for Swers
• Intake & assessment
• Supervision
• Family Pres
• Recruitment & Supervision of foster homes
• Adoption