Children's Services Reform Research: Scotland’s Children’s Services Landscape: The Views and Experiences of the Children’s Services Workforce

Alex McTier, Mihaela Manole, Jane Scott, Emma Young, Nadine Fowler, Leanne McIver, Carol Ann Anderson, Robert Porter, Heather Ottaway - CELCIS

This report explores, through responses to an online survey, interviews and focus groups, the opportunities, challenges, barriers and facilitators that members of the workforce identify as factors which bring about high quality experiences and outcomes for children, young people and families using services; close multi-agency working between practitioners across different services; continuity of support when young people transition to adult services; high quality support for the workforce and transformational change in services.

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Children’s Services Reform Research: Mapping Integration and Outcomes Across Scotland: A Statistical Analysis

Micky Anderson, Joanna Soraghan, Adrian Bowman, Carol Ann Anderson, Emma Young, Alex McTier, Heather Ottaway - CELCIS

Mapping integration and outcomes in Scotland: A statistical analysis investigated if the most recent major structural reform of health and social care services to take place in Scotland has had an impact on outcomes for children, young people and families.

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Children’s Services Reform Research: Case Studies of Transformational Reform

Alexander McTier, Kate Mackinnon, Heather Ottaway - CELCIS

Case studies of transformational reform programmes examined a range of approaches to the delivery of children’s services to better understand the evidence regarding systems-level integration between children’s social work/social care with health services and/or adult social care.

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Children's Services Reform Research: Rapid Evidence Review

Robert Porter, Emma Young, Jane Scott, Leanne McIver, Kate Mackinnon, Nadine Fowler, Heather Ottaway - CELCIS

Strand 1: Rapid Evidence Review reviewed existing published national and international research evidence focused on better understanding the evidence associated with different models of integration of children’s services with health and/or adult social care services in high income countries, as defined by the World Bank.

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Children's Services Reform Research: Learning and Implications for Scotland

Heather Ottaway, Alex McTier, Mihaela Manole, Micky Anderson, Robert Porter, Jane Scott, Emma Young, Nadine Fowler, Joanna Soraghan, Leanne McIver, Carol Ann Anderson, Kate MacKinnon - CELCIS

The goal of this study was to improve the understanding of current children’s services structures and delivery models in Scotland and how services can best support the needs of children, young people and their families. The research looked at how services are provided and configured in Scotland and drew on a range of international evidence too.

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The War Against Ukraine’s Children

Georgetown University Collaborative on Global Children’s Issues, the Edmund A. Walsh School of Foreign Service, the Embassy of Ukraine in the United States, the U.S. Department of State

In this conversation moderated by Gillian Huebner, executive director of the Collaborative on Global Children’s Issues at Georgetown University, panelists outline Ukrainian efforts to protect its children and the measures international partners can take to support an effective response to the impact of Russia’s policies of aggression on Ukraine’s future.

A Future-Ready Social Service Workforce: Navigating the Realities of Climate Change and Ageing Populations

Global Social Service Workforce Alliance

On 7 February 2024, the Global Social Service Workforce Alliance hosted a webinar to showcase the findings from their recently released 2023 State of the Social Service Workforce Report: A Decade of Progress, A Future of Promise. 

First Version of the Joint Monitoring Framework For The European Child Guarantee, Prepared by the Social Protection Committee’s Indicators’ Sub-Group and the European Commission

European Commission

This document presents an overview of the first version of the EU monitoring framework for the European Child Guarantee (ECG). It was developed by the Indicators’ Sub-Group (ISG) of the Social Protection Committee (SPC) and the European Commission, and endorsed by the SPC in November 2023.

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Making a Way Out of No Way: The Importance of Improving Financial Instability Among African American Kinship Care Families

Tyreasa Washington, Mathieu Despard

This study examined African American families who are providing informal kinship care in the U.S. with the aim of developing a nuanced understanding of the financial characteristics, challenges, and coping strategies of these families.

Hagan Valer Nuestras Voces

Kate Butler, Ph.D, Vanessa Currie, MA, Katie Reid, MA and Laura Wright, Ph.D. - International Institute for Child Rights and Development

Respuestas de niñas, niños, adolescentes y jóvenes a una encuesta mundial para el Día de Debate General 2021 sobre los Derechos del Niño y el Cuidado Alternativo

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Faites en Sorte Que Notre Parole Compte

Kate Butler, Ph.D, Vanessa Currie, MA, Katie Reid, MA and Laura Wright, Ph.D. - International Institute for Child Rights and Development

Réponses d’enfants et de jeunes à une enquête mondiale en vue de la Journée de débat général sur les droits de l’enfant et la protection de remplacement 2021

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Culture is Healing: Removing the Barriers Facing Providers of Culturally Responsive Services (Policy Brief)

Esi Hutchful - Center for the Study of Social Policy

Ensuring child and family well-being requires a radically different, anti-racist response of supports that center the voices of diverse children and families of color, are dignified and strengths-based, and that are offered in spaces they trust. As this brief highlights, community-based organizations across the U.S. are striving to answer that call despite numerous barriers. This brief lifts up the voices of those community providers, with the goal of highlighting and addressing the barriers that stand in the way of all families having the support they need.

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Culture is Healing: Removing the Barriers from Culturally Responsive Services (Webinar)

Center for the Study of Social Policy

In this webinar, community providers discussed the challenges they face in providing responsive services, including building evidence and operating in the context of restrictive “evidence-based” standards, as well as recommendations for actions state and federal policymakers can take to ensure all families have the support they need through expanding access and availability of programs that are developed by and for communities of color.

Strengthening Families Webinar: Trauma, Resilience, Care of Self, Community Care, and the Role of Culture

Center for the Study of Social Policy

On December 14, 2023, Kheya Ganguly led a presentation on the Center for the Study of Social Policy's monthly Strengthening Families webinar. This presentation unpacked how to better understand how trauma affects practitioners and the ones they support. Attendees learned about new ways to conceptualize resilience by considering it rather as a transformation. 

Making the Case for Transition - Kinnected Partner, India/Australia

Better Care Network in partnership with Kinnected

This video case study was developed as a part of the Transitioning Models of Care Assessment Tool training package. It is 1 of 8 video case studies exploring different aspects of learning on transitioning residential care services. To access the full set of case studies or the training package, visit the BCN Transition Hub.

Mapping the Structures and Functions of National Human Rights Institutions (NHRIs) in Africa on Child Rights

African Committee of Experts on the Rights and and Welfare of the Child - ACERWC

ACERWC released a study on the structures and functions of NHRIs on child protection to assess how child rights issues are incorporated in their mandates. The study identifies challenges and proposes areas to strengthen collaboration.

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Les Enfants Sans Protection Parentale en Afrique

ACERWC, African Union

Le Comité africain d'experts sur les droits et le bien-être de l'enfant (ACERWC/le Comité), en collaboration avec les États membres de l'Union africaine, les organisations partenaires, les enfants et les jeunes, a lancé la première étude continentale en son genre sur les enfants sans protection parentale (CWPC) en Afrique. L'étude, menée de 2020 à 2022, au milieu de la pandémie de COVID-19, couvre plus de 43 pays dans les cinq régions d'Afrique.

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Children Without Parental Care in Africa

ACERWC, African Union

The African Committee of Experts on the Rights and Welfare of the Child (ACERWC/the Committee), in collaboration with African Union Member States, partner organizations, children and young people, launches the first of its kind Continental Study on Children Without Parental Care (CWPC) in Africa. The study, conducted from 2020 to 2022, amid the COVID-19 pandemic, covered over 43 countries in the five regions of Africa.

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Born into Care: Understanding Care Pathways and Placement Stability for Babies in Wales (Summary)

Laura Cowley, Laura North, Karen Broadhurst, Stefanie Doebler, Bachar Alrouh, Linda Cusworth, Mariam Abouelenin, Lucy Griffiths

This report provides new evidence about entry routes to care, pathways through care, and placement outcomes for the very youngest children in the care system in Wales. It is the seventh in the Born into Care series.

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Born into Care: Understanding Care Pathways and Placement Stability for Babies in Wales

Laura Cowley, Laura North, Karen Broadhurst, Stefanie Doebler, Bachar Alrouh, Linda Cusworth, Mariam Abouelenin, Lucy Griffiths

This report aims to shed light on care pathways and placement stability for infants in Wales, using data from the Children Looked After census collected by Welsh Government. The report is divided into two parts, the first of which focuses on infant entry to care and the second, which focuses on pathways and placement outcomes.

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Predictors of Care Leavers’ Health Outcomes: A Scoping Review

Luke Power, Mark Hardy

This systematic review contained studies that were mostly based in the U.S. and had three primary research aims: (1) to identify the key predictors of care leavers’ health; (2) to understand how determinants of health are conceptualised within the literature; and (3) to understand what methods and data sources are used to understand the health outcomes of care leavers.

Inclusion of Children and Youth in Foster Families: Aims, Challenges and Solutions

Mari Rysst

This chapter in the book "Child Welfare and the Value of Family Privacy" addresses aims and challenges in the processes of including children and youth in foster families and suggests a solution inspired by anthropological literature. The author argues that the ‘best interests of the child’ are closely tied to staying in a stable foster home, which emerged in interviews with children in the Norwegian Child Welfare Services (CWS) and foster parents.

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Coming of Age in a Pandemic Era: The Interdependence of Life Spheres Through the Lens of Social Integration of Care Leavers in Quebec During the COVID-19 Pandemic

Victor Fernandes, Anta Niang, Rosita Vargas Diaz, Martin Goyette

This paper explores how the COVID-19 pandemic affected care leavers in Quebec, a social group already facing obstacles to social integration.

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Should Foster Care Replace the Family? Child Welfare and the Value of Family Privacy

Eirik Christopher Gundersen

In this chapter in the book "Child Welfare and the Value of Family Privacy", the author discusses moderate alternatives to address problems of the family by enhancing the presence of state agencies in family life. The author asks if organising families as foster homes is less morally objectionable than raising children in families by examining the child welfare system in Norway.

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Parents Who Inject Drugs: Demographics, Care Arrangements and Correlates for Child Placement in Out-of-Home Care

Jocelyn Chan, Bernadette Ward, Lisa Maher, Sione Crawford, Mark Stoové, Paul Dietze

Children in families affected by substance use disorders are at high risk of being placed in out-of-home care (OOHC). The authors of this Australia-based study aimed to describe the characteristics of parents who inject drugs and identify correlates associated with child placement in OOHC.

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Foster Carers’ Views of the Transition from Foster Care to Adulthood for Young People with Mental Health Problems from a Life-Course Perspective

Ingrid Höjer, Inger Oterholm

This article aims to build knowledge, from a life-course perspective, of foster carers’ views of the transition from care to adulthood for young people with mental health problems by interviewing carers from foster homes in Norway and Sweden.

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Prospects for Children in 2024: Cooperation in a Fragmented World (Executive Summary)

Jasmina Byrne, Melvin Bretón, Gary Risser, Cristina Colon, Andaleeb Alam, Camila Teixeira, Manasi Nanavati, Steven Vosloo, Tamara Rusinow - UNICEF

The 2024 Global Outlook Prospects for Children: Cooperation in a Fragmented World examines how global fragmentation along geopolitical and economic lines will impact children in 2024 and beyond. It highlights eight key trends that will shape children’s lives and provides policy guidance to protect their rights and well-being amid this uncertainty.

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Prospects for Children in 2024: Cooperation in a Fragmented World

Jasmina Byrne, Melvin Bretón, Gary Risser, Cristina Colon, Andaleeb Alam, Camila Teixeira, Manasi Nanavati, Steven Vosloo, Tamara Rusinow - UNICEF

Prospects for Children in 2024: Cooperation in a Fragmented World is the latest edition of the Global Outlook, a series of reports produced each year by UNICEF Innocenti – Global Office of Research and Foresight, which look to the key trends affecting children and young people over the following 12 months and beyond.

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As They Move: Child and Youth Experiences of Migration, Displacement and Return in Afghanistan

Zeudi Liew, Mark Gill, Lucy Hovil

The experience children and young people who migrated from their homes in Afghanistan – especially those who have been forced to return – can be described as a spiral of harm and neglect. For many, poverty and a desire to help their families drives them from their homes.

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