Resources Database

Manitoba has one of the highest rates of children taken into care of child welfare services (Child and Family Services; CFS) in the world, and also one of the highest youth incarceration rates in Canada. There is substantial overlap between the child welfare and youth justice systems, with overrepresentation of Indigenous youth in both systems. Culturally appropriate programs and policies aimed at supporting parents, families and communities to care for their own children will likely have long-term positive impacts on the youth justice system.

This study sought to distinguish youth in the child welfare system who became involved with the justice system from youth who did not become involved with the justice system based on the youth's protective factors and their caregivers' parenting skills.

Child protection systems across the global South suffer from common problems, one of the most critical among which is low number and skills of relevant professionals to deliver services. Additionally, child protection professionals are often demotivated, uncoordinated and isolated, with limited access to continuous training and support. Peer learning and capacity building networks help address these issue, and often leverage the spread and scope of information and communications technologies.

The 2019 Prevention Resource Guide is designed to help individuals and organizations in every community strengthen families and prevent child abuse and neglect. It includes chapters on: Strengthening Individuals, Families and Communities; Working With Families Using the Protective-Factors; Using Protective Factors as a Framework for Your Community Partnership; Protecting Children; Tip Sheets for Parents and Caregivers; and Resources.

Children with developmental disabilities are overrepresented in the child welfare system. Although caseworkers play a key role in ensuring that the special needs of these children are met, little is known regarding caseworkers’ knowledge about, exposure to, and comfort with people with developmental disabilities. In this exploratory study, through use of an online anonymous survey, local county caseworkers were asked to self-rate their knowledge, exposure, and comfort levels.

The Child Rescue Centre became the first orphanage in Sierra Leone to fully transition from residential to family-based care. The decision to transition was made for many reasons, but the most unique reason is found in the story of Child Rescue Centre Director, Mohamed Nabieu. Nabieu, brought to the orphanage in 2000, and spent the majority of his childhood in the facility before returning as its Director. Following a 2016 directive from the Sierra Leonean government working with UNICEF for all orphanages to develop plans for deinstitutionalization.

This article presents the results of a systematic mapping of social work training programs in countries throughout West Africa, a region historically under‐represented in global discussions of the social welfare workforce. The research illuminates how social workers and related professionals are trained to engage in social work practice in a number of West African countries. The research was conducted in two phases. In the initial phase, the research team collected documents from 12 West African countries and conducted phone interviews with relevant individuals.

Educação não formal para o mainstreaming de género na área da juventude

This report summarizes the evidence for cash transfer programming and child protection in humanitarian contexts and recommends areas for action and further research. It highlights the gaps, needs, and opportunities found in the literature and confirmed by experts working across child protection, cash transfer programming, and other relevant areas of humanitarian action and international development. 

In this study, interviews with institutional caregivers and social workers, complemented with site observations at selected institutions for children, details some of the challenges care institutions and children transitioning into adulthood and out of care face. The study concludes by making recommendations for ways to address these challenges. 

This paper highlights five practices from within the EU, all of which illustrate promising responses to protecting children in migration. The practices include reception and care arrangements, procedural safeguards to support and assist children and ways to improve the identification of durable solutions for each child. They have a common focus on strengthening both child protection systems and access to those systems.

This paper reports on innovative research methods using Global Positioning System devices that can trace social workers' mobilities and explore the use of office space, home working and visits to families in two English social work departments. This article presents unique findings that reveal how mobile working is shaping social care practitioner wellbeing and practice.

In recent years, various professional associations in social work and regulatory bodies worldwide have engaged in ambitious efforts to draft and implement comprehensive ethics guidelines, standards, and education. For a variety of complex reasons, the social work profession in India has lagged behind developments in many other nations.

Culturally responsive practice is often influenced by the extent to which social work practitioners apply indigenous and innovative philosophies, methods, approaches, and models. There is consensus among social work scholars regarding the need for the social work profession to develop and adopt models and approaches that promote culturally relevant social work practice.

This article explores the construction of childhood and parenthood in rural communities in Indonesia based on a series of focus group discussions with service providers, community decision makers, and para professionals. The interviews sought to examine providers’ definition of successful children and perception of factors that could undermine a child’s success. A review of Indonesia’s educational and child protection policy framework shows there are many parenting programs, but authors argue that without structural changes, these programs will be ineffective.

This research seeks to develop a deeper understanding of community strategies for preventing serious violations of children’s rights before they occur. Most interventions intended to protect children are currently designed to begin after harm has occurred: remove children from places of exploitation, then attempt to support their recovery and social integration.

This 4th annual report consolidates trends and data from 32 countries to make recommendations for better planning, development and support to this frontline workforce.

The training manual presents a three-day curriculum and includes lecturettes, participatory activities, and handouts to support implementing partners working with orphans and other vulnerable children and key populations to increase implementing partners’ capacity to design and implement interventions that are gender-aware and -transformative, and prevent and respond to gender-based violence (GBV).

MEASURE Evaluation worked with six OVC projects in six countries to gain insight on current approaches to OVC case management, map how costs can be linked to OVC case management activities, and determine the cost of OVC case management. To further inform and strengthen our understanding of the cost data, the study also qualitatively explored the context of the community workers' experiences related to OVC case management. 

This toolkit is intended to guide participatory, national level analyses of the social service workforce.