Jill Duerr Berrick - Böcker

The Impossible Imperative brings to life the daily efforts of child welfare professionals working on behalf of vulnerable children and families. Stories that highlight the work, written by child welfare staff on the front lines, speak to the competing principles that shape everyday decisions. The book shows that, rather than being simple task of protecting children, the field of child welfare is shaped by a series of competing ideas. The text features eight principles that undergird child protection practice, all of which are typically in conflict with others. These principles guide practice and direct the course of policymaking, but when liberated from their aspirational context and placed in the real world, they are fraught with contradiction. The Impossible Imperative is designed to inspire a lively debate about the fundamental nature of child welfare and about the principles that serve as the foundation for the work. It can be used as a teaching tool for aspiring professionals and as motivation to those looking to social work to make a difference in the world.

This is an open access title. It is available to read and download as a free PDF version on Oxford Academic and is made available under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International licence.

The first few years of life are a time of unparalleled physical, intellectual, and emotional development. But they can also be a time of neglect and abuse: this is the period when children are most likely to suffer mistreatment by their parents, and most likely to be placed in foster care. Today most children entering the child welfare system are very young, and, in most large states, infants are the largest group of children entering foster care each year. Social service systems are typically not designed for very young children, however, and therefore fail to serve their special needs. This shortcoming is significant because protecting very young children from physical harm is not enough; they must also be protected from developmental harm.The Tender Years is the first textbook to address this critical situation. Beginning with an overview of child development theory, it examines child abuse reporting patterns and discusses placement in foster care, reunification, and adoption. It also looks at public child welfare practice, featuring vivid examples of the children and families served by this system. The authors analyse the differences between the foster care experiences of very young children and those of older children, with special emphasis on the way the child welfare system deals with infants. Based on a significant body of evidence regarding young childrens unique affective, physical, and cognitive development, this text illuminates the interrelationship of child welfare practice, child development outcomes, and public policy. The authors offer a fundamental framework for decision-making in child welfare when young children are involved, and recommend specific changes in policy and practice aimed at moving the system toward greater developmental sensitivity.Timely and provocative, The Tender Years is essential reading for courses in child welfare, social work with children, and social work with the family, as well as a valuable resource for child welfare administrators and policy makers.

Modern family life raises tough questions: Who should be responsible for children's daily care? How can their financial support be fairly allocated between parents? Should extended family members be paid for their help? Can women have full careers and also be good mothers? In Raising Children, leading scholars take on these questions and more in order to critically assess policy responses to the changing needs of the modern family. As parents struggle to balance professional and personal demands, choose schools for their children, and sort through constantly updated medical and psychological information, they need help from public officials who can make policies that realistically address childrearing's contemporary challenges. The insightful contributions in this volume provide an excellent starting point for understanding these thorny, multifaceted issues, skillfully framing the influences on child development, such as altered family dynamics, major life changes like immigration, and the role of schools and government in children's health. Adoption by same-sex couples, difficulties for immigrant children, the ADHD diagnosis controversy, and public intervention for at-risk children are only a few of the topics covered. With society in a constant state of flux, it is critically important that we assess our family and child policies to ensure that they provide families with the assistance they need. Drawing on the rich interdisciplinary work of the Berkeley Center for Child and Youth Policy, this is an eye-opening look at some of the biggest issues facing the family today, which are as complex as they are vital to address in a thoughtful way.

There is a profound crisis in the United States' foster care system, Jill Duerr Berrick writes in this expertly researched, passionately written book. No state has passed the federally mandated Child and Family Service Review; two-thirds of the state systems have faced class-action lawsuits demanding change; and most tellingly, well over half of all children who enter foster care never go home. The field of child welfare has lost its way and is neglecting its fundamental responsibility to the most vulnerable children and families in America. The family stories Berrick weaves throughout the chapters provide a vivid backdrop for her statistics. Amanda, raised in foster care, began having children of her own while still a teen and lost them to the system when she became addicted to drugs. Tracy, brought up by her schizophrenic single mother, gave birth to the first of eight children at age fourteen and saw them all shuffled through foster care as she dealt drugs and went to prison. Both they and the other individuals that Berrick features spent years without adequate support from social workers or the government before finally achieving a healthier life; many people never do. But despite the clear crisis in child welfare, most calls for reform have focused on unproven prevention methods, not on improving the situation for those already caught in the system. Berrick argues that real child welfare reform will only occur when the centerpiece of child welfare - reunification, permanency, and foster care - is reaffirmed. Take Me Home reminds us that children need long-term caregivers who can help them develop and thrive. When troubled parents can't change enough to permit reunification, alternative permanency options must be pursued. And no reform will matter for the hundreds of thousands of children entering foster care each year in America unless their experience of out-of-home care is considerably better than the one many now experience. Take Me Home offers prescriptions for policy change and strategies for parents, social workers, and judges struggling with permanency decisions. Readers will come away reinvigorated in their thinking about how to get children to the homes they need.

Over 30 years ago, the United Nations developed the Convention on the Rights of the Child (UNCRC), heralding the importance of protecting children from a range of human rights violations. Among these are the right to be free from abuse and neglect at the hands of parents or other caregivers, and the responsibility of states to devise a protective response. How nations conceptualize harm and even how they define childhood varies markedly across the globe. This Handbook describes and analyzes the ways in which 50 countries from every continent, except Antarctica, have devised measures for child protection emphasized in the UNCRC. The Handbook discusses the legislative responses, public administrative systems, and the social service networks that governments have put in place to secure the protection of children against maltreatment and exploitation. Synthesizing data from across the world, the authors suggest a global typology of child protection systems for understanding the diversity of service responses. The typology consists of five ideal types that have as their emphasis protection against an array of risks to childhood and that represent the focal point for government intervention in the lives of families. They include child exploitation protective systems, child deprivation protective systems, child maltreatment protective systems, child well-being protective systems, and child rights protective systems. The Handbook is a valuable resource for researchers, students, and policymakers attempting to craft thoughtful state responses to children's needs

More than two million child abuse reports are filed annually on behalf of children in the United States. Each of the reported children becomes a concern, at least temporarily, of the professional who files the report, and each family is assessed by additional professionals. A substantial number of children in these families will subsequently enter foster care. Until now, the relationships between the performance of our child welfare system and the growth and outcomes of foster care have not been understood. In an effort to clarify them, Barth and his colleagues have synthesized the results of their longitudinal study in California of the paths taken by children after the initial abuse report: foster care, a return to their homes, or placement for adoption. Because of the outcomes of child welfare services in California have national significance, this is far more than a regional study. It provides a comprehensive picture of children's experiences in the child welfare system and a gauge of the effectiveness of that system. The policy implications of the California study have bearing on major federal and state initiatives to prevent child abuse and reduce unnecessary foster and group home care.

This volume culls the most important and provocative research and policy analysis in the child welfare field and is an essential guide for understanding the burgeoning field of children's services.

This volume culls the most important and provocative research and policy analysis in the child welfare field and is an essential guide for understanding the burgeoning field of children's services.

This volume assembles important research on child neglect, kinship care, and the effects before, during, and after the employment of foster care. Concluding with a detailed account of family reunification efforts, the final section offers invaluable insight into alternative methods of reuniting children with their families.

Co-authored by eminent scholars in the field, this book surveys the processes and outcomes of child welfare services in the US, drawing global parallels in order to capture the challenges, tensions, and opportunities facing child welfare services.Written in a clear and accessible manner, the book outlines which child welfare system reforms are likely to have the greatest benefit for at-risk and maltreated children and families. Chapters cover crucial debates and initiatives mapping the evolution of child welfare services in the US and presenting comparisons with other approaches to child welfare services across the globe. The authors adopt a chronological approach, from initial contact to case closings, beginning with the prevention of child maltreatment and extending through out-of-home care, with a particular emphasis on services to older youth. The book also considers how to approach issues stemming from the importance of understanding and addressing diversity in race, ethnicity, and culture among child welfare involved families and offers opportunities for the evolution of child welfare services.Understanding Child Welfare is an illuminating read for students and scholars in social work, psychology, public health, and sociology. It is also a useful resource for practitioners, policymakers and other actors involved in child welfare services internationally.

More than two million child abuse reports are filed annually on behalf of children in the United States. Each of the reported children becomes a concern, at least temporarily, of the professional who files the report, and each family is assessed by additional professionals. A substantial number of children in these families will subsequently enter foster care. Until now, the relationships between the performance of our child welfare system and the growth and outcomes of foster care have not been understood. In an effort to clarify them, Barth and his colleagues have synthesized the results of their longitudinal study in California of the paths taken by children after the initial abuse report: foster care, a return to their homes, or placement for adoption. Because of the outcomes of child welfare services in California have national significance, this is far more than a regional study. It provides a comprehensive picture of children's experiences in the child welfare system and a gauge of the effectiveness of that system. The policy implications of the California study have bearing on major federal and state initiatives to prevent child abuse and reduce unnecessary foster and group home care.