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Abstract
The task of fostering adolescents is unique, requiring skills, qualities, and information that acknowledge each young person's particular needs. This editorial summarises a range of research in this special issue covering parenting styles, transitions out of care, child sexual exploitation, and the needs of LGBTQ and separated teenagers. Three themes emerging from the papers are discussed: autonomy and control; risk, resilience, and…
This editorial introduces the Voices Special Issue on Music Therapy and Child Welfare. "We are very excited to publish this special issue that focuses on music therapy and childwelfare," say the authors. "Just over a year ago, Rebecca Fairchild approached Voices with this idea, which we whole-heartedly embraced. This is an area that has to date received too little attention in music therapy, one that has tremendous implications for equity and social justice."
Articles in this issue include:
"What kind of a country are we, in which the most vulnerable children cannot rely on ministers and councils to treat them well?" asks this editorial piece from the Guardian. The Guardian notes "the use of unregulated placements, the disruption caused by frequent moves and the damage done to those forced to relocate many miles from their homes, schools and families," all of which have been "featured in court judgments and parliamentary and National Audit Office reports as well as in journalism by the Guardian and others."
According to the editorial, children’s…
"There has been slow but consistent growth in private foster care placements and an increase in the number of companies in this market," writes Patrick Costello in this opinion piece for TheJournal.ie. "While these companies plug a gap in services, a gap that can leave children at risk, ultimately they lead to negative outcomes across the system," Costello argues. "This is not a reflection on the excellent work done by foster families with private services, but a consequence of systemic issues."
In this opinion piece for NBC News's Think, Shanta Trivedi, a clinical teaching fellow at the Georgetown University Law Center, argues that "if we’re serious about protecting Black families as a whole, we cannot limit the conversation to the police alone. We need to transform the child welfare system, too." In the article, Trivedi shines a light on the "lesser-known police-to-foster care pipeline that is often the starting point for the destruction of families and horrific long-term outcomes for children, particularly Black children."
The author describes how, in the United…
In this piece for the Chronicle of Social Change, Vivek Sankaran writes about personal experience as a family defense lawyer and witnessing the racial disparity in the U.S. child welfare system, particularly in the racial bias in the discretion of child protective services (CPS) caseworkers. "More than 60% of the cases CPS caseworkers investigate involve only 'neglect.' State laws usually define neglect as lack of adequate food, clothing and shelter. While a few of those cases might involve parents who intentionally withhold those material items from children, the vast majority will…
In this opinion piece for Youth Today, Benjamin Bencomo - an assistant professor of social work at New Mexico Highlands University - writes about his experience as a social worker supporting an Indigenous young person as he aged out of foster care and how he learned to allow the young person to define his own goals for a successful transition to adulthood.
"He was going to get an academic scholarship, and with financial assistance provided through our department using Chafee funding, he was going to attend a large university and get a bachelor’s degree and perhaps…
As the number of children in foster care in the US continues to rise, this blog post from the Brookings Institute highlights the "growing need to prioritize effective recruitment and retention for foster parents, including relative (or kinship) foster parents" and the foster parent recruitment and retention guide developed by the CHAMPS campaign and the Brookings Institution’s Center on Children and Families. The development of the guide was shaped by a national convening which "brought together 80 public and private child welfare agency staff, foster parents, former…