Child Care and Protection Policies

Child care and protection policies regulate the care of children, including the type of support and assistance to be offered, good practice guidelines for the implementation of services, standards for care, and adequate provisions for implementation. They relate to the care a child receives at and away from home.

States and all organisations with child care programmes should have child care policies which are in line with national legislation and international law, e.g. the Convention on the Rights of the Child (CRC). In line with the CRC, emphasis should be placed on the child’s best interests, with support to families prioritised in order to prevent family separation. Good gatekeeping mechanisms are essential in ensuring families receive the services they need and are entitled to, and to guard against inappropriate placement into poor care arrangements.

Home-based care, day care, and other family support services are mechanisms for assisting families in providing for the child’s development and, when used appropriately, can prevent child separation. When a child is unable to remain at home, alternative forms of community based care should be prioritised, such as formal kinship care or foster care. The use of institutions should be highlighted as a last and temporary measure. All support and care provisions should outline the referral and admission process, the use of care plans, regular reviews, rehabilitation, and aftercare procedures.

Child protection legislation which recognises that abuse can be physical, emotional, sexual, or neglect, and may be carried out by parents, caretakers, children and other adults is required. All agencies working with children should have written child protection policies which respect the rights of the child. Policies should outline behaviours and actions which are unacceptable, provide standards for the appropriate care of children, and clear guidelines on what procedures to follow and by whom, including reporting mechanisms for suspected abuse to an assigned authority for investigation.

Child care and protection policies require resources and monitoring of standards to ensure their appropriate implementation. Adequate provision and training of child care and social work staff is required to deliver family support services and alternatives forms of child care. All staff working with children should be trained and supervised in providing appropriate care for children, identifying abuse, and responding appropriately.

The literature in this section contains country reports and examples of national and organisational child care and protection policies.

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Live-In Family Enhancement (LIFE): a comprehensive program for healing and family reunification

Lawrence Deane, Jenna Glass, Inez Vystrcil-Spence, Javier Mignone - First Peoples Child & Family Review, 01 Oct 2018

This paper documents findings from an evaluation of the Live-In Family Enhancement (LIFE) program, and recommends that this approach be expanded for use in prevention as well as reunification.

Supporting the implementation of Council Tax exemption for Scotland’s care leavers: Good practice note

Kenny McGhee - CELCIS, 01 Oct 2018

This practice note is drawn from the discussion and outlines key considerations and a range of measures for local authorities to take as Corporate Parents to ensure consistent and effective implementation of the regulations, now established in law.

Entangled Roots: The Role of Race in Policies that Separate Families

Elisa Minoff - Center for the Study of Social Policy, 01 Oct 2018

By examining the roots of policies that separate families and their entanglement with racial prejudice and discrimination, this report makes the case that we must embrace an alternative path.

Protecting Migrant Children

Mary Crock and Lenni B. Benson, 28 Sep 2018

Framed around compelling case studies explaining why children are on the move in Africa, the Americas, Asia, Europe, the Middle East and Oceania, this book explores the jurisprudence and processes used by nations to adjudicate children’s protection claims.

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Measurement Based Care in Child Welfare-Involved Children and Youth: Reliability and Validity of the PSC-17

Jedediah H. Jacobson, Michael D. Pullmann, Elizabeth M. Parker, Suzanne E. U. Kerns - Child Psychiatry & Human Development, 27 Sep 2018

This study evaluates whether the psychometric properties of the Pediatric Symptoms Checklist-17 (PSC-17), a common behavioral health measure typically used as a dichotomous screening tool for mental health needs, support its use as a continuous measure for tracking behavioral health over time.

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A Call for Culturally-Relevant Interventions to Address Child Abuse and Neglect in American Indian Communities

Apryl Joe, Cora McElwain, Kyla Woodard, Stephen Bell - Journal of Racial and Ethnic Health Disparities, 27 Sep 2018

This paper explores the literature of the existing interventions that are specifically used with American Indian families affected by child abuse and neglect.

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Racial disparities in the proportion of needed services maltreated children received

Tyrone C. Cheng, Celia C. Lo - Children and Youth Services Review, 25 Sep 2018

This secondary analysis of data describing 1186 maltreated children, drawn from the US National Survey of Child and Adolescent Well-Being II, examined racial disparities in their access to and receipt of needed services and in their caseworkers' case planning and engagement with caregivers.

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Care Leavers’ and Their Care Workers’ Views of Preparation and Aftercare Services in the Eastern Cape, South Africa

Sue Bond - Emerging Adulthood, 24 Sep 2018

In this qualitative study with four Child and Youth Care Centers in a town in the Eastern Cape, South Africa, focus groups were held with young people in care and their care workers to discuss preparation for leaving care and aftercare services and the evaluation of these by each group of participants.

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The role of out-of-home caregivers in the achievement of child welfare permanency

Colleen C. Katz, Marina Lalayants, Jon D. Phillips - Children and Youth Services Review, 22 Sep 2018

This longitudinal study is the first to evaluate the ways in which out-of-home (OOH) caregivers influence permanency outcomes for children in the foster care system while controlling for child-level and parent-level characteristics.

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Country Care Review: Algeria

Better Care Network , 21 Sep 2018

This country care review includes the care-related Concluding Observations adopted by the Committee on the Rights of the Child and the Committee on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities.