This exploratory study looked at Child Protective Service workers' perceptions of how housing issues affect their decisions in the removal of children from their parents, and the reunification of children with their parents. The survey examined San Bernardino County Child Protective Service workers in the Inland Empire region of California.

No description available.

The purpose of the current study was to clarify the importance of social relationships in the retention of social workers in Child Welfare agencies. Data had been gathered by the California Social Work Education Center, University of California Berkeley, in a 2-year state funded study, titled "Retention of California's Child Welfare Workers".

Public child welfare agencies experience front line worker turnover rates as high as 25% a year. Worker turnover has significant financial costs to agencies, and has been linked to negative outcomes for children in care. Prior research has linked organizational factors, such as organizational climate, culture, and supervisor satisfaction, to turnover intent in child welfare populations. This research uses an empowerment framework to turn to workers directly to answer the question, "What are the organizational factors that lead frontline child welfare workers to stay or leave the agency, and what, then, are the implications for agency administrators?" This study relies upon secondary data of a workforce study conducted by the Child Welfare Partnership at Portland State University's School of Social Work. The data was collected via a pilot internet survey of approximately 400 State-employed Oregon child welfare case workers across all geographic regions in the state, and focuses on workers who plan to leave for preventable reasons. This study explored links between organizational factors and turnover in a sample of Oregon public child welfare workers. This research finds that climate, culture, supervision, and knowledge of the job prior to hire are all significantly correlated with intent to leave. Climate is most significantly correlated to Intent to Leave, and explains 25% of the variance in intent to leave in a regression model. These research findings suggest that agency administrators who are interested in improving worker retention can monitor and address local culture and climate as one tool for increasing workforce stability. Retention may be improved by maintaining an organizational culture and climate that is empowering to workers and that encourages workers to be a part of the change process. Additional implications for the child welfare workforce, social work research, and social work education are discussed.

The purpose of the present research was to explore the political underpinnings that shape the meaning that native child welfare workers give to their work. This was achieved with the use of a participatory research model that combines group interviews (sharing circle) with ethnography as a means of data analysis. The resulting narratives have suggested that the meaning native child welfare workers attribute to their work emerges from their community and the provincial structures that legislate and define child welfare policies, two sources, composed of various sub-systems, that often share polarized values and ideologies in matters of child welfare. This struggle is further complicated by the cultural relevance of child welfare services in the debate surrounding sovereignty and colonialism. It is suggested that more attention be given to understanding this meaning and how this process must originate from the community if indeed the deriving services are to be both culturally relevant and community based.

No description available.

Indiana University-Purdue University Indianapolis (IUPUI) / Child abuse remains a serious health problem in the U.S. Yet, there are preventative programs that can significantly improve the parenting experienced by very young children and result in lower incidence of maltreatment. Home visitation is the most prevalent and successful form of primary prevention. These programs are staffed by home visitors who empower parents and are the lynchpin of home visitation programs. What makes some home visitors excel at this work is the focus of this research. A small, non-random, purposive sample of excellent home visitors and their administrators was used to learn about the personal characteristics of outstanding home visitors. The mixed methods design of this research included qualitative interviews, home visiting situational vignettes, and quantitative tests of personality attributes. The results indicated that this group of outstanding home visitors possessed important similarities. First, the home visitors were effective at forming and maintaining empathic relationships. The variables that facilitate the formation of the therapeutic relationships between home visitor and client include: (a) “good enough empathy” (need not be extraordinarily empathic but at least averagely so), (b) positive regard (showing respect to the families and recognizing that the parent is the expert on their child), and (c) congruence. Secondly, the home visitors possessed self-awareness allowing for reflective practice and forming and maintaining better client relationships. Thirdly, the excellent home visitors possessed an attitude of lifelong learning. Fourthly, the home visitors strongly believed in the ability of their clients to change. This was accomplished by focusing on client strengths. Finally, in order for the home visitors to assist parents in therapeutic change, they had a belief in and understanding of systems theory and the impact that the environment can or has had on those clients. Without an ecological approach, home visitors are likely to blame the families with which they work for their unfortunate situations such as poverty. Each of the five characteristics can be taught and improved, but entrenched beliefs are less easily manipulated. The five characteristics are ordered with the first (effective at forming relationships) the most amenable to change and the last (an ecological approach) the least.

South African child and youth care programmes have been challenged to transform to address the needs of vulnerable and/or orphaned young people affected and/or infected by HIV/AIDS. The Isibindi programme was designed by the National Association of Child Care Workers to respond to this challenge to provide viable community child and youth care programmes. Supervision of staff plays a critical part in child and youth care programmes. This study explores the model of supervision being implemented in the Isibindi programme, identifies the elements of this model and stipulates which of these need to be strengthened for effective and efficient services. The research findings indicate that the Isibindi model of supervision reflects the practice of child and youth care services being delivered in the programme. Common child and youth care elements were identified as being essential to the efficient delivery of this model of supervision. / Health Studies / (M. Tech. (Child and Youth Care))

Abstract not available

This study was inspired by the desire to understand the experience of mental health clinicians coping with work related stress in treating traumatized children. In studying this experience, heuristic design and methodology was followed. The findings of this study are based on interviews of 3 Caucasian, female clinicians, a 49-year-old art therapist with eight years experience, a 61-year-old licensed clinical social worker with 34 years of postgraduate experience, and a 44-year-old licensed clinical social worker with 21 years of experience. Mental health practitioners, clinical supervisors and consultants as well as professionals in counselor education benefit from the findings of this study that extends knowledge of effective coping with work related stress in treating traumatized children. Participants in this study coped by using the following core characteristics the most often: seeking emotional and instrumental support from others, maintaining balance in work and private life, staying spiritually oriented, participating in leisure activities, focusing on health and using cognitive restructuring techniques. The least mentioned was the use of humor. Four themes permeated the experience of these clinicians: (1) Maintaining Balance: Coping included maintaining a balance in work and private life; (2) Healthy Personal Identity: Coping successfully meant keeping the career as work and not a definition of the self; (3) Clear Role Definition: Coping to continue the work included increased focus on professional and personal boundaries and the role of the clinician; (4) Realistic Control: Successful coping included differentiating between what can and can't be controlled. This study also found that part of coping with work-related stress meant moving from the public sector into private enterprise. In private practice, participants found that coping with stress improved with the decrease of high client caseload requirements and the ability to screen potential clientele for the purpose of creating a balance in treatment issues. Overall, this study found that the experience of coping successfully with work-related stress had a great deal to do with increased professional autonomy. / Graduation date: 2003