In the United States of America, it is a parent's fundamental right to raise their children without state interference. Each state in the US has its own agency responsible for the protection of children. In Los Angeles, California this agency is known as DCFS (Department of Children and Family Services). This agency is responsible for responding to reports of child abuse and neglect, and the handling of adoptions. In the past social workers were responsible for assessing child abuse reports and determining whether or not a child would be detained. However, these days a computer will be handling these tasks. Computers and a system call an SDM (Structured Decision Making) will now be responsible for running a risk assessment and determining whether to remove a child.
This process starts as soon as a tip comes through the child abuse hotline. In Los Angeles county there are around 3,000 calls each week of suspected child abuse. The computer generates questions which the social worker answers based on the information from the report and allegations received. Based on these answers the computer will either add or deduct a points. The higher the score-the higher the risk level. At the end of the computer generated assessment the score is then verified by a social worker and if the level meets the legal threshold, a social worker begins an investigation. There has been criticism and argument of whether this computerized system is capable to assessing such serious situations. Social workers utilize personal experience and natural intuition, these make up a human beings decision making process which only a human can comprehend. However others say that by using the SDM, it provides more objectivity where social work...
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...rities the computer generates the an assessment of the level of risk. Since no two cases or alike, it is unlikely that what worked for one family will work for all families. Each case is unique and requires the skill and judgement only a human being can provide.
Works Cited
Drury-Hudson, J. (1999). Decision making in Child Protection: The Use of Theoretical, Empirical and Procedural Knowledge by Novices and Experts and Implications for Fieldwork Placement. British Journal Of Social Work, 29(1), 147-169.
Swift, K., & Callahan, M. (2009). At Risk : Social Justice in Child Welfare and Other Human Services. Toronto: University of Toronto Press.
Shlonsky, A., & Gambrill, E. D. (2001). Child and Adolescent Safety: Risk Assessment in Child Welfare. In , Child Welfare for the Twenty-First Century (pp. 302-318). Columbia University Press.
During the court case the judge said that lead social worker Gunn Wahlstrom was “naïve beyond belief”. This report brought over 68 recommendations to make sure cases like this did not happen again. The recommendations included putting the child first and the parent’s second. “Jasmines’ fate illustrates all too clearly the disastrous consequences of the misguides attitude of the social workers having treated Morris Beckford and Beverley Lorrington as the clients first and foremost” (London Borough of Brent, 1985,p295). The social workers in Jasmine’s c...
Wilson, K. and Adrian J. L. (2007) The Child Protection Handbook: The Practitioner's Guide to Safeguarding Children. Edinburgh: Bailliere Tindall
Popple, P. R, & L. Leighninger. (2011). Social Work, Social Welfare, and American Society. Boston, MA: Pearson Education, Inc.
As a Child Protective worker, my responsibilities are to assess safety (immediate), risk (future harm), abuse and maltreatment, and make a determination as to whether a child is safe or at risk of future harm and assess the need for services. The child welfare worker assigned to investigate the case failed to ensure the above. Works Cited Downs-Whitelaw, S., Moore, E., & McFadden, E. J. (2009). The 'Standard' of the 'Standard'.
Downs, S., Moore, E., McFadden, E., & Costin, L. (2004). Child welfare and family services: Policies and practice. (7th. Ed., pp. 319-363) Boston, MA: Allyn & Bacon.
With the increasing number of cases each day, concerns are being raised as to whether the rights of parents are being violated. It is common knowledge that there have been serious accuracy flaws resulting in the wrongful termination of many parents’ rights. However, little is being done to fix these errors and give parents their children back. Child Protective Services is the most needed yet unwanted agency in each state. While a system is necessary to intervene and protect children who are abused, there is speculation on the procedures and policies the state uses.
Children’s Social Care work with parents and other agencies to assess the stages of child protection procedures, record information and make decisions on taking further action. The police work closely with this agency to act on decisions made such as removing a child or the person responsible for the abuse while gathering evidence and carrying out investigations regarding the matter. Health professionals have a duty to report suspected non-accidental injuries to Children’s Social Care and examine children to give evidence of abuse. The Children Act 2004 requires every local area to have a Local Safeguarding Children Board to oversee the work of agencies involved in child protection, place policies and procedures for people who work with children and conduct serious case reviews when children die as a result of abuse. The NSPCC is the only charitable organisation that has the statutory power to take action when children are at risk of abuse. They provide services to support families and children and two helplines for children in danger and adults who are concerned for a child’s safety. They also raise awareness of abuse, share their expertise with other professionals and work to influence the law and social policy protect children more efficiently. There are also acts in place to protect children such as the Children Act 1989, the United Nations Convention On The Rights Of The Child 1989, the Education Act 2002 and the Children Act 2004. Legal framework from such acts are provided for Every Child Matters which requires early years practitioners to demonstrate that they provide activities that help children protect themselves. This may be through books and group talks known as “Stranger
Handon, R. M. (2014, December). Client Relationships and Ethical Boundaries for Social Workers in Child Welfare. The New Social Worker, (winter), 1-6.
All the benefits provided by CAPTA are important, but one highly important benefit CAPTA provides for infants and children is that all allegations of child abuse and neglect must be investigated to ensure the well-being and safety of every infant and child. After allegations of child abuse and neglect are reported an investigation is the next step in protecting every child. Another benefit of CAPTA for infants and children is that if the heart wrenching experience of child abuse or neglect occur the state CPS systems and private organizations are trained and prepared to provide treatment for the child. In a like manner, CAPTA provides benefits for women and families by providing support and services that address domestic violence. CAPTA also promotes family involvement in all aspects of a CPS case involving child abuse and neglect. The states benefit by the foundation that CAPTA sets regarding the functioning of CPS systems and in a financial aspect. CAPTA provides funding to “Support child abuse and prevention activities by funding discretionary grants to states and/or public or private agencies or organizations” (California Department of Child Services, 2011). Everyone benefits when CPS systems according to CAPTA policies, “The act’s sponsors meant to feature three important themes of CPS reform in these amendments, including encouraging the involvement of family members in a child welfare agency’s decisions process; promoting and enhancing COS collaboration with domestic violence services and substance abuse treatment programs, and increasing the use of differential response by states through the use of noninvestigative/nonaccusatory approach to responding to reports of child maltreatment” (American Bar Association,
The controversial issue of whether or not Child Protective Services are doing their jobs properly, has grabbed nationwide attention. Child Protective Services is the name of a government agency in many states of the United States whose mission is to respond to reports of child abuse and neglect. Some of these cases may include physical abuse, sexual abuse, and mental abuse (Wikipedia). The child welfare system is corrupted. The parents and guardians who are accused of abuse are automatically labeled as guilty and will have to prove their innocence; instead of being innocent until proven guilty.
Popple , P. R., & Leighninger, L. (2011). Social work, social welfare, and american society. (8th ed.). Boston, MA: Pearson Education, Inc.
Most services provided to families by the child welfare system have complicated requirements that make it nearly impossible for them to receive all the necessary resources. For example, the child welfare system currently provides the family with a packet of resources, in which the family on their own must contact agency after agency for services, just to be notified that there are fees to receive services or there are long waiting lists. For the most part, families are then discouraged from asking for further assistance. The child welfare system needs to be able to address the underlying issues that disadvantaged families are dealing with, which may be playing a role in the child maltreatment occurring in the home, whether it is general neglect or child abuse.
The job of a child welfare worker appears to be a demanding profession that promotes the child’s safety, but also strengthens the family organization around them in order to successfully raise the children. This child welfare workers work in the system known as the Child Protective Services whose initiative is to protect the overall welfare of the child. The short novel From the Eye of the Storm: the Experiences of a Child Welfare Worker by Cynthia Crosson-Tower demonstrates the skills necessary to deal with the practice of social work along with both its challenges and its happy moments. The novel consists of some of the cases involving Tower’s actual career in social work. In reading the book, I was able to experience some of the actual cases in which children dealt with physical and mental abuse from their families that caused them to end up within the system. Also, some of these children had issues in adapting to foster and adoptive families based on the issues they faced earlier in life. As we have learned earlier in the course, the violence that a child experiences early in life has an overall affect on the person they become as they grow into adulthood. When children deal with adverse childhood experiences, they are at a higher risk for abusing drugs and/or alcohol, increased likelihood of abusing their own child or spouse, higher rates of violent and nonviolent criminal behavior, along with several other issues throughout their lifespan.
Social welfare policy and the review of the YouTube video “The Tip Of The Iceberg: Social Work, Social Justice and Social Action – Darrell Wheeler, Ph.D.” The video gets off to a slow start but once the keynote speaker steps up to the mic, he begins to describe social work, social justice and social action with incredible intellect and very few notes. Dr. Wheeler knows his subject area extremely well and is passionate in leading others by sharing his knowledge.
Funding is awarded to support ongoing research programs to identify, prevent and treat child abuse and neglect and to collect and distribute data. Projects that are currently funded are Child Welfare Information Gateway website, the National Resource Center for Child Protective Services, National Quality Improvement Center on Differential Response, annual publication of Child Maltreatment and the initiative on Supporting Evidence-Based Home Visitation to Prevent Child Maltreatment.