“The Signs of Safety approach is a relationship-grounded, safety-organized child protection framework designed to help families build real safety for children by allowing those families to demonstrate their strengths as protection over time. This strengths-based and safety-organized approach to child protection work requires partnership and collaboration with the child and family. It expands the investigation of risk to encompass strengths and signs of safety that can be built upon to stabilize and strengthen the child’s and family’s situation. Central to this approach is meaningful family engagement and, in particular, capturing the voice of the child” (http://www.cebc4cw.org/program/signs-of-safety/detailed). Because this approach proposes a framework for child welfare it offers broad applicability to the areas of juvenile justice, foster care and adoption. If one looks at the principles of this approach across all child welfare settings it is evident that they can be used as a map for assessing and planning, building constructive relationships, and improving communication.
A youth that has committed a delinquent offense will be monitored by a caseworker which might involve home and school visits, drug screens or anything else that may be a stipulation or requirement of the probation. Sometimes the youth is committed to the custody of the state and then that worker is responsible for assessing the level of care, safety, and supervision the youth will require while in custody. This is accomplished through a series of assessments, interviews and observations. The Juvenile Justice worker should make every effort to include the parent or guardian in the assessment and decision making process involving the youth and shoul...
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...f Safety approach such as assessment, building positive relationships and increased communication can contribute to success in all areas of child welfare. Through this process the caseworker can foster a more open and possibly more productive relationship with a juvenile, foster care provider, and adoptive parent or child through a questioning approach. The worker can use the framework to assess and analyze information, emphasize strengths and organize information regarding the family, and also set permanency goals for the family and the agency.
Works Cited
The California Evidence-Based Clearinghouse for Child Welfare. Signs of Safety. Retrieved from http://www.cebc4cw.org/program/signs-of-safety/detailed.
Turnell, A., & Edwards, S. (1999). Signs of Safety: A solution and safety oriented approach to child protection casework. New York: W.W. Norton & Company.
The job of a child welfare worker appears to be a demanding profession that promotes the child’s safety, but also strengthens the family organization around them in order to successfully raise the children. This child welfare workers work in the system known as the Child Protective Services whose initiative is to protect the overall welfare of the child. The short novel From the Eye of the Storm: the Experiences of a Child Welfare Worker by Cynthia Crosson-Tower demonstrates the skills necessary to deal with the practice of social work along with both its challenges and its happy moments. The novel consists of some of the cases involving Tower’s actual career in social work. In reading the book, I was able to experience some of the actual cases in which children dealt with physical and mental abuse from their families that caused them to end up within the system. Also, some of these children had issues in adapting to foster and adoptive families based on the issues they faced earlier in life. As we have learned earlier in the course, the violence that a child experiences early in life has an overall affect on the person they become as they grow into adulthood. When children deal with adverse childhood experiences, they are at a higher risk for abusing drugs and/or alcohol, increased likelihood of abusing their own child or spouse, higher rates of violent and nonviolent criminal behavior, along with several other issues throughout their lifespan.
One of the fasting growing juvenile treatment and interventions programs are known as teen courts. Teen courts serve as an alternative juvenile justice, to young offenders. Non-violent, and mostly first time offenders are sentenced by their peers’ in teen courts. Teen courts also serve as juvenile justice diversion programs. Teen courts vary from state to state, and sometimes within the same state. With this program, all parties of the judicial setting are juveniles with the exception of the judge. Each teen court, is designed specifically to meet the needs of the community it serves. Teen courts were created to re-educate offenders throughout the judicial process, create a program with sanctions that will allow the youth not to have a juvenile record, and to also instil a sense of responsibility.
Wilson, K. and Adrian J. L. (2007) The Child Protection Handbook: The Practitioner's Guide to Safeguarding Children. Edinburgh: Bailliere Tindall
The Juvenile Justice system, since its conception over a century ago, has been one at conflict with itself. Originally conceived as a fatherly entity intervening into the lives of the troubled urban youths, it has since been transformed into a rigid and adversarial arena restrained by the demands of personal liberty and due process. The nature of a juvenile's experience within the juvenile justice system has come almost full circle from being treated as an adult, then as an unaccountable child, now almost as an adult once more.
Implementing successful prevention strategies will require the need to provide assistance to the entire family and focus both on the child’s safety and well-being as well as the parents’ emotional and economic well-being.
Many children across the country are wrongfully removed from their homes everyday by workers with an anti-family mindset, who use removal as a first resort not a last. It is not only detrimental to the child’s well-being, but is also immorally abusive to the child. The goal of the child welfare system is to promte safety, permanency, and wellness among all children.
It is a process that the juvenile has to comply with for an informal probation other than going to jail, and conditions are set by the court (Torbet, 1997). The juvenile probation is called the workhorse (Delisi, & Conis, 2013). The juvenile probation system has programs to help with issues for the juveniles and their families. There is a team of people in the court system who all work together to help and treat juveniles with serious mental issues. The team is comprised of judges, juvenile probation department, county medical hospital, District attorneys office, and the public defenders office.
What is important to understand in terms at the difference between the juvenile and adult system is that there is a level of dependency that is created tween the two and the juvenile system focuses on how to help rather than in prison individuals at such a young age. However, it usually depends on the type of crimes that have been committed and what those crimes me for the families and how they impact of the greater society. The adult system distinguishes between dependence and delinquency mainly because there was a psychological transition that occurs with juveniles that is not always a predictor of a cyclical life of crime. However, if an adult is committed to the justice system there can be a dependency of delinquency and a cycle of crime that is more likely to be sustained at that age and level of cognitive ability then in comparison to a juvenile. The reasoning behind this is important is that is focused on maintaining a level of attention to the needs and capacity abilities of individuals living and working in different types of societies (Zinn et al.,
The juvenile community corrections population has experienced a tremendous growth over the past two decades. In cities like Miami, Florida in places like Liberty City, called “Pork and Beans,” the volume of adjudicated youths ordered to formal probation increased by 67% according to Adams (2011). Juvenile crime has been on a rise, in Miami, Florida since 2002. The police believe that young people are becoming targets, more than before because they are young and are sending them to juvenile court. This growth has had serious inferences for juvenile probation officers that make frequent choices about the case management of juvenile offenders on a daily basis. Juvenile probation officers have to type dispositions and assignment references,
A state that undertakes custody of a child is declaring that it can do a better job providing protection. This system is a powerful agent of support, providing positive nurturing environments that enable a child to reach his or her potential. Nonetheless, when children suffer additional abuse in the system, this government intervention should be questioned.
As a Child Protective worker, my responsibilities are to assess safety (immediate), risk (future harm), abuse and maltreatment, and make a determination as to whether a child is safe or at risk of future harm and assess the need for services. The child welfare worker assigned to investigate the case failed to ensure the above. Works Cited Downs-Whitelaw, S., Moore, E., & McFadden, E. J. (2009). The 'Standard' of the 'Standard'.
ii. A clear framework for local safeguarding boards for monitoring local services effectiveness. iii. Guidance aims to help professionals understand what they need to do and what they can expect of one another in order to safeguard/keep children
The focus of the juvenile justice system is to rehabilitate juvenile offenders, rather than to imprison and punish like the systems adult counterpart. According to Caldwell (1961) the juvenile justice system is based on the principle that youth are developmentally and fundamentally different from adults. This has lead to the development of a separate justice system for juveniles that was initially designed to assist troubled juveniles providing them with protection, treatment, and guidance. When performing as it is designed and up to the initial intentions, the juvenile court balances rehabilitation (treatment) of the offender with suitable sanctions when necessary such as incarceration. According to Mack (1909) the focus of the juvenile justice system has shifted from “how can we help the child”, “why did the child commit the crime” to “was the crime committed”. According to Griffin (2008) in some cases juveniles may be required to be “transferred” to adult court. The prerequisites for transfer to adult court are the duty to protect the public from violent youths, serious crime, and the lack of rehabilitation chance from the juvenile court. According to Flesch (2004) many jurisdictions handle the issue of serious juvenile crime by charging juveniles as adults. Charging a juvenile as an adult is done by a method which is called waiver to adult court. This waiver allows adult criminal court to have the power to exercise jurisdiction over juveniles and handle the juvenile’s case as an adult’s case would be tried. According to Flesch (2004) a juvenile is both tried and if convicted of the crime the juvenile will be sentenced as an adult when his or her case is waived from the juvenile court. Waiver to adult court initially was viewe...
This is a hearing since the juveniles do not stand before a trial. The hearing will be scheduled by the intake officer. While proceeding to the court, the judge may talk to the people concerned about the juvenile, evaluate any evidence that was collected if a crime was committed or any other complaints against the juvenile, and consider the youth’s previous history if any crimes were committed and how many times the juvenile has been in trouble with the law. The judge will then order an outcome which can result in probation, institutionalization, formal diversion, or even holding the juvenile for charges against him or her. Probation is supervised and the juvenile must stay at home or in a community setting, but must report to his or her officer regularly. The juvenile must follow all probation conditions granted by the court such as obeying the laws, staying in school, staying away from drugs and alcohol and other requirements instructed. Institutionalization is a form of detention system that is to rehabilitate deviant youths. They also serve as a protection for at-risk youths. There are two types of Juvenile institutions: Long-term correctional and short-term temporary care. Long-term includes, for the most part, training schools, youth ranches and camps, and boot camp. They also usually place male and females separately. Short-term facilities include jails, shelters, detention homes, and reception areas. In the facility you also
They work with the police, probation officers, health, housing and children’s services, schools, charities and the local community. These people are trained to recognize and identify areas of risk, under achievement and change in a juvenile’s life. In the case of a second youth caution, or where a young person has previously received a conditional caution, the YOT has a statutory duty to carry out an assessment of the young offender and consider putting in place an intervention program aimed at preventing reoffending