Social Work Commons^™

Working Report #5: Child Welfare Jobs (Service Provider Perspectives), Gary Cameron, Lirondel Hazineh, Karen Frensch

Partnerships for Children and Families Project

This report compares how service providers experience their employment realities across central, integrated, and accessible service models. Differences in job satisfaction, worker retention, and feelings about the work itself are examined.

Life Domain Research Report Series: Family (2010 Update), Gary Cameron, Lirondel Hazineh, Karen Frensch, Michele Preyde

Partnerships for Children and Families Project

A key consideration in understanding the long term community adaptation of children and youth involved with residential treatment or intensive family services is the role that family plays in sustaining or eroding gains made by children and youth in treatment (Frensch & Cameron, 2002). This report includes a summary of family descriptive information, the nature of family relationships, and indicators of family functioning for children and youth who have participated in children’s mental health services.

Data were collected about youth who had been involved with children’s mental health residential treatment (RT) or intensive family service programs (IFS), designed as an …

Life Domain Research Report Series: Youth And Parent Health And Well Being (2010 Update), Michele Preyde, Karen Frensch, Gary Cameron, Lirondel Hazineh

Partnerships for Children and Families Project

Children and youth who have participated in children’s mental health services often continue to live with a variety of emotional and behavioural challenges after service involvement has ended (Cameron, de Boer, Frensch, & Adams, 2003). A key consideration in understanding the long term community adaptation of these children and youth is the ongoing management of emotional and behavioural challenges and the impact these challenges have in the daily lives of youth and their families. Several standardized measures of mental health, physical health, stress, and quality of life were used to assess parental and youth functioning in the life domain of …

Working Report #3: Use Of Legal Measures And Formal Authority (Service Provider Perspectives), Lirondel Hazineh, Gary Cameron

Partnerships for Children and Families Project

The focus of this report is, across service delivery models, how front-line protection workers viewed their formal authority role and the extent to which they relied on legal measures in order to achieve protection goals. The analysis is guided by several overarching questions including (1) how does each model view the use of legal measures and formal authority? (2) How does each model impact service providers’ actual use of legal measures? (3) What value do workers place on the authority figure role? And (4) how effective is the use of formal authority in reaching child protection goals?

Type of program …

Working Report #1: Service Model Accessibility (Service Provider Perspectives), Lirondel Hazineh, Gary Cameron

Partnerships for Children and Families Project

This report examines the differences in service accessibility across central, integrated, and school/community based child welfare service delivery models including geographic proximity to families, acceptability of the setting to families, and accessibility expectations of service providers. Results suggest that accessibility characteristics of the model can make a significant difference to front-line service delivery from the perspective of front-line protection workers.

A defining feature of the community and school based child welfare models was increased accessibility for families and workers. Through making themselves more accessible, the community and school based settings had some significant service delivery advantages including more regular, varied, …

Working Report #2: Client And Community Relations (Service Provider Perspectives), Lirondel Hazineh, Gary Cameron

Partnerships for Children and Families Project

This report addresses two important questions: how much emphasis is placed on building positive relationships with families and communities across agency based, integrated service, and community and school based models of service delivery? And, how successful is each model at building relationships, minimizing stigma for families, and improving the image of child welfare in the community?

Educating clients and the community about child welfare services was identified as an important role for workers in some sites and not in others. While families’ fears of child protection services were a concern, some workers also expressed a fear of their clients and …

Working Report #4: Range Of Services (Service Provider Perspectives), Lirondel Hazineh, Gary Cameron

Partnerships for Children and Families Project

This working report examines the differences in range of services across central, integrated, and school/community based sites including referrals to other services, direct support, advocacy, and collaborative efforts to provide services to families. Which models provide the most service options for families? How do service providers view the service options available to them in their work with families? How helpful are services to families?

The range of services available within agency based settings seemed the narrowest in comparison to other types of service delivery settings. Integrated service models appeared to increase the range and access to many formal services. Community …

Working Report #7: Helping Relationships In Child Welfare (Parent Perspectives), Lirondel Hazineh, Gary Cameron, Karen Frensch

Partnerships for Children and Families Project

This report examines the nature of first contacts in child welfare, the level of contact between families and service providers, and the quality of relationships over time across central, integrated, and accessible service delivery models.

I. First Contacts Clarity, consultation, use of power, and positive shifts in perception were central issues identified by parents when discussing their experiences of first contacts with child welfare. More parents in accessible sites had experiences with workers who were clear and provided a sense that they would be supported. Within the accessible sites a strong philosophy of collaboration emerged between worker and participant. Participants …

Life Domain Research Report Series: Social Connections And Community Conduct (2010 Update), Lirondel Hazineh, Karen Frensch, Michele Preyde, Gary Cameron

Partnerships for Children and Families Project

Understanding how youth participate in social networks with peers and friends, engage in social or leisure activities, and more generally forge healthy relationships with others are key considerations in assessing overall well being of youth. Among a variety of emotional and behavioural challenges faced by children and youth involved with residential treatment or intensive family services may be their ability to negotiate relationships within social contexts (Cameron, de Boer, Frensch, & Adams, 2003).

Data were collected about youth who had been involved with children’s mental health residential treatment (RT) or intensive family service programs (IFS), designed as an alternative to …

Life Domain Research Report Series: School And Employment (2010 Update), Karen Frensch, Lirondel Hazineh, Gary Cameron, Michele Preyde

Partnerships for Children and Families Project

Earlier research by the Partnerships for Children and Families Project on the daily living realities of youth and children involved with mental health services, particularly residential treatment, revealed the ongoing and pervasive nature of difficulties youth and children experienced in their academic functioning (Cameron, de Boer, Frensch, & Adams, 2003). As the education experience is such a large part of youth and children’s lives, we sought to better document how children and youth were performing in school in the current study.

Data were collected about youth who had been involved with children’s mental health residential treatment (RT) or intensive family …

Transforming Front Line Child Welfare Practice: The Impacts Of Institutional Settings On Services, Employment Environments, Children, And Families, Non-Retrospective Technical Report: Accessible Program And Agency Based Program Parent Survey Results From Case Opening And Follow Up, Karen Frensch, Gary Cameron, Lirondel Hazineh

Partnerships for Children and Families Project

Outcomes of accessible and central service models are assessed in this non-retrospective technical report using three criteria: (1) impacts on parent, child and family functioning; (2) impacts on system functioning (e.g. child placements, court involvements); and (3) impacts on parent and community attitudes towards child protection organizations.

Retrospective Technical Report: Accessible Program Parent Survey Results From Case Opening And Follow Up (Using Retrospective Data), Karen Frensch

Partnerships for Children and Families Project

This retrospective technical report supports the summary of outcomes of accessible and central child protection service delivery as found in the Synthesis Report (Cameron, Hazineh & Frensch, 2010): Transforming Front-Line Child Welfare Practice: The Impacts of Institutional Settings on Services, Employment Environments, Children, and Families. The focus of this and other working reports is on the inclusion of all information relevant to the specific topic of investigation. The intent of working reports is to inform the synthesis report and include more information than what appears in the synthesis report. Less emphasis, however, is placed in the working reports on style …

Fathers And Child Welfare: Fathers' Service Experiences With The Child Welfare System, Nick Coady

Partnerships for Children and Families Project

This research report provides an overview of the findings about 18 men’s experiences of service involvement with a Children’s Aid Society in Southern Ontario. The data reported here are part of a larger study that also focused on these men’s daily living realities. Themes discussed in this report include positive aspects of men’s child welfare involvement such as worker characteristics men appreciated, as well as, negative aspects of services including formulaic interventions and anti-male biases. Service implications are discussed. This document is intended as both a standalone document and a companion report to the Father's Life Experiences report. This report …

Fathers And Child Welfare: Stories Of Men’S Everyday Lives And Service Experiences, Gary Cameron

Partnerships for Children and Families Project

This volume of stories from fathers involved with child welfare services acts as both a stand-alone document and a companion document to the research reports on father’s life experiences and child welfare service experiences. This volume is intended for multiple audiences including child welfare service providers, community organizations working with men, students and instructors interested in men’s issues, and fathers. This volume of stories may be useful for teaching purposes, service provision decisions, and general interest.

Mothers And Child Welfare: Stories Of Women’S Everyday Lives And Service Experiences (Story Volume), Gary Cameron

Partnerships for Children and Families Project

This volume of stories from mothers involved with child welfare services acts as both a stand-alone document and a companion document to the research report on mothers’ experiences of child welfare services entitled Stories of Mothers and Child Welfare. This volume is intended for multiple audiences including child welfare service providers, community organizations working with women, students and instructors interested in women’s issues, and mothers. This volume of stories may be useful for teaching purposes, service provision decisions, and general interest.