Your Presenters

• Melissa Connelly, Director, Regional Training Academy Coordination Project, CalSWEC

• Sylvia Deporto, Deputy Director, Family & Children’s Services Division, Human Services Agency, City & County of San Francisco

Our Goal

Highlight links among the elements of the practice model and the Katie A./Pathways to Wellbeing Core

Practice Model

Practice Model Background• California counties have tried many promising practices to

improve outcomes for children and families• We noticed that many of the new practices had common

elements• Some recent efforts have even tried to combine different

initiatives into more comprehensive practice models

We wanted to work together to build on that

Towards a Statewide Practice Model

• The County Welfare Directors Association (CWDA) Children’s Committee has been working to develop a statewide practice model

• Monthly meetings• Statewide Workshops Goal:

– To define California’s Child Welfare Services as a profession grounded in theory, with a set of core values, common elements and identified behaviors

Guiding Vision– California’s 58 counties

embrace one practice model that guides their individual

Child Welfare Services programs by integrating

successful practices into a framework that supports the

achievement of safety, permanency and well-being for

children and their families in the Child Welfare Services

system.

Stakeholder Engagement

• The California model is built on work done with stakeholders who helped develop CAPP and other practices– Youth, Parents,

Caregivers, Tribes, Communities, University partners

Let’s take a closer look at the model.

Practice Model Elements

Theoretical framework

Values and principles

Casework components

Practice elements

Practice behaviors

Theoretical Framework• Our theoretical framework is an organized set

of explanatory principles that help us understand:– What leads to the problem of child maltreatment?– How can we work to prevent child maltreatment

from starting or stop it once it has started?

Theoretical Framework

ValuesOur values provide an expression of an ideal or optimal state of being. They explain what we are striving for in our work with families.

Evidence-Informed

Organizational Support

Permanency

SafetyGrowth

and Change

Cultural Responsiveness

Partnership Professional Competency

Well-Being

Respectful Engagement

This is What We Believe

Our Values

Casework Components:

This is What We Do

Practice Elements: This is How We Do It

• Engagement• Inquiry / Exploration• Advocacy• Teaming• Accountability• Workforce Development

and Support

Practice Behaviors

• Define practice elements so agency and community partners know what to expect and can build coordinated services and supports.

• Support evaluation of model fidelity and outcomes.• Provide a framework for practice.

Practice Behaviors

• Provide direction to practitioners about how they will practice social work using the practice model.

Behaviors

1. Be open, honest, clear, and respectful in your communication.

2. Be accountable.3. Listen to the child, youth, young adult, and

family and demonstrate that you care about their thoughts and experiences.

4. Demonstrate an interest in connecting with the child, youth, young adult, and family and helping them identify and meet their goals.

Behaviors

5. Identify and engage family members and others who are important to the child, youth, young adult, and family.

6. Support and facilitate the family’s capacity to advocate for themselves.

7. From the beginning and throughout all work with the child, youth, young adult and their family, engage in initial and ongoing safety assessment, risk assessment, and permanency planning.

Behaviors

8. Work with the family to build a supportive team.9. Facilitate the team process and engage the team in

planning and decision-making with and in support of the child, youth, young adult, and family.

10. Work with the team to address the evolving needs of the child, youth, young adult, and family.

11. Work collaboratively with community partners to create better ways for children, youth, young adults, and families to access services.

Behaviors

12.Work with the family and their team to build a plan that will focus on changing behaviors that led to the circumstances that brought the family to the attention of the child welfare agency and assist the child, youth, young adult, and family with safety, trauma, healing, and permanency.

13.Work with the family to prepare for change in advance and provide tools for managing placement changes, social worker changes, and other significant transitions.

Our Goal

Highlight links among the elements of the practice model and the Katie A./Pathways to Wellbeing Core

Practice Model

So, let’s look at a crosswalk

We want to know:• What are your ideas for supporting implementation of

the core practice model?• What concerns do you have about implementing the

model into classroom and field instruction?• What are your ideas about how you could partner

with CWS agencies to support implementation?

Share Your Ideas

Next Steps

• Identify organizational factors necessary to create environment for implementation

• Identify resources necessary to support counties in implementation

• Identify counties to pilot implementation