Social Workers' Perceptions of Family Preservation Programs

The passage of the Adoptions and Safe Families Act of 1997, with its focus on child safety and concurrent planning, has presented family preservation workers with new challenges and new opportunities. Twenty volunteers from a large comprehensive social service agency were interviewed to determine their experiences with two models of family preservation—Multisystemic Therapy (MST) and Traditional Family Preservation Service (TFPS) or practice as usual. Workers from both programs were able to articulate values consistent with family preservation as important strengths of the programs— keeping families together and empowering families for example. Information from referring agencies was described as variable and not especially useful when working with seriously troubled families, especially as it related to risk and child safety. Both groups indicated that the jargon of family preservation had permeated their agencies, and that working with other agencies was at times a challenge, though for different reasons. Finally, despite some reservations about the effectiveness of short-term treatment with families that face serious challenges, both groups of workers were generally satisfied with family preservation as an approach to practice.

Promising Practices to Engage Families and Support Family Preservation

The Adoption and Safe Families Act of 1997 (ASFA) is the latest legislation in two decades of important child welfare policy in the United States. The Adoption and Safe Families Act has served to shorten the period of time that caseworkers and families have to show that families are making progress toward family preservation, with permanency decisions being made after 12 months, rather than 18. The importance of engaging and motivating families in services has therefore increased. The practice directive of ASFA can be summarized as 'Act Smart, Fast, and Accountable. " Using findings from largely correlational research, concrete recommendations are made to ensure that practices to preserve families are smart, fast, and accountable, particularly critical given these new timeframes.

Creating a Family-Centered Plan: Family Negotiation in Child Welfare

In this article, the conceptual and theoretical underpinnings for child welfare negotiations, assessment strategies useful in preparing for such negotiations, and practice implications for child protective service workers involved in the process are explored. Particular emphasis is given to the benefits of employing negotiation techniques in child welfare matters. The opportunities to use negotiation strategies are numerous in the child welfare arena. They range from formal mediation of an adoption plan, to family group conferencing of a placement issue, to negotiating a visitation and access plan with a parent. Common to all of these situations is the recognition that families have a better chance of success and potential for a better outcome when they are part of the planning and when they are empowered in the process.

Preserving Family: Themes from a Qualitative Study of Kin Caregivers

This article presents themes from a qualitative study of 58 African American female kinship caregivers in San Francisco. Core concepts that emerged describe various paths along which children move into kin homes, and caregivers' mixed emotional reactions to becoming surrogate parents. Women also discussed multiple family roles they assumed after taking in children. Responses highlight three primary reasons for becoming caregivers that center on providing for and protecting these children—particularly from the perceived threat of the public foster care system—and ultimately preserving the family unit. Paradoxically, caregivers' reasons mirror the stated goals of the public foster care system, which they view as a threat to family stability. We discuss the problems of implementing practice and policy recommendations for permanency and family preservation and how to bridge the gap between the deeply held negative beliefs of African American caregivers towards the public system and begin to build trust.