This article by staff attorney for family law and child welfare at the Virginia Poverty Law Center's Center for Family Advocacy, Valerie L’Herrou, outlines and analyses several new bills introduced by the Virginia General Assembly in 2018 and their impacts on young people aging out of the foster care system and family reintegration.

This short human rights in action article takes a critical approach to the translation of policy to practice and highlights risks involved with haste, outcomes measured in numbers and unrealistic timeframes, and rapidly transforming practice with nascent investment in a country’s capacity to assess and respond to the real needs of children and families within their communities.

This chapter of the Routledge Handbook of Critical Social Work, written by David Tobis, examines an inspiring story of dramatic change in New York’s child welfare system and how parents whose children were in foster care contributed to those changes. It demonstrates how grassroots activism can be suggestive for critical social work.

Adolescents who are involved with child welfare systems, either in foster care or under child welfare supervision, across Canada, disproportionately “cross-over” to youth criminal justice proceedings. This article critically considers disadvantages “cross-over” youths face under the Youth Criminal Justice Act (YCJA).

This article tracks the history of foster care licensing requirements in the U.S. state of Minnesota, discusses the real-life story of a grandmother with a grandchild placed in foster care, explains the federal mandates established through the Adam Walsh Act, discusses the existing flaws in the process, and highlights the ways in which Minnesota’s current statutory scheme and processes disproportionally impact communities of color.

This research is based on a stock-taking of the current situation. It is based on a comprehensive literature review and a genuine primary research with service users as well as policy makers, service providers, children and families.

This publication is presented in three parts. Part 1 discusses how seeing Haitian children as part of a complex and beautiful social system can inform best practices in child care reform. Part 2 highlights eight organizations working towards family-based care and the preservation of families and communities. Part 3 provides inspiration for collective action and transformation.

This brief explains the structure and roles of this country core team (CCT) established by Armenia’s Ministry of Labor and Social Affairs in June 2017 and the team’s usefulness as a platform for collaboration for the reform of national policies and systems for the care of vulnerable children: “national care reform.”

This volume provides readers around the globe with a focused and comprehensive examination of how to prevent and respond to child maltreatment using evidence-informed public health approaches and programs that meet the needs of vulnerable children, and struggling families and communities. Detailed guidance is provided about how to re-think earlier intervention strategies, and establish stronger and more effective programs and services that prevent maltreatment at the population level.

Sri Lanka's National Policy on the Alternative Care of Children outlines a comprehensive range of alternative care options and encourages the reforming of all formal structures that provide at-home and out­-of-home services for children deprived of care and protection or at risk of being so. This policy also extends to children under care of the Juvenile Justice System. It provides policy solutions to programming for children at risk of family separation and facing deprivations such as child abuse, neglect, child labor, poverty, addiction, imprisonment, human trafficking, mental and physical disabilities, HIV/AIDS, domestic violence, orphanhood, abandonment and displacement etc. The policy also takes into consideration and encompasses provisions to children who are forced to live and work on streets.