Helping families and their kin develop care plans for orphaned and vulnerable children was the objective of the family group conferencing (FGC) training that took place in Guatemala City from July 10-12, 2012. This family preservation approach for developing strategies to prevent the institutionalization of children emphasizes the strengths of families and their capacity to solve their own problems and develop their own care plans.
The training was a collaborative initiative by the Social Welfare Secretariat (Secretaría de Bienestar Social-referred to by the Spanish acronym SBS), UNICEF Guatemala, and Social Work faculty from Brigham Young University, North Carolina State University, and Virginia Commonwealth University. A FGC orientation training was provided to 41 psychologists and social workers from a range of institutions, including the public child welfare, civil society organizations, and three universities.
