Child Welfare Act Summary

Every Child Matters 2003 and Children Act 2004 updated in 2010 to Help Children Achieve More

Many of the children who are placed into the care of Child Protective Services are situated into hellish foster homes with people who only care about the money they receive from the government for each child that is placed under their roof; and not for the welfare of the children. Numerous amounts of children that are caught up in the system, especially

It is a reasonable argument that child welfare service entities are necessary as it is all too frequent that child abuse/neglect cases are heard all over the nation and is ultimately a world health issues.  Increasing social issues such as unstable families, poverty, crime, poor education, lack of access to health care and mental health services are some of the factors that contribute to this continuous epidemic that affects many people from various socio-economic classes. Many nations have taken steps to enhance and improve efforts in the fight against the mistreatment of children.

What is child abuse? From the word “abuse” we can understand that it is some sort of a maltreatment of a child, causing harm and damage both to his physical and psychological well-being. At the Federal level, the Child Abuse Prevention and Treatment Act (CAPTA) describes child abuse and neglect as: “any recent act or failure to act on the part of a parent or caretaker, which results in death, serious physical or emotional harm, sexual abuse, or exploitation, or an act or failure to act which presents an imminent risk of serious harm.” Child abuse is a very substantial and widely spread problem in U.S. affecting children of any age, gender, race, background or income, with more than 1.8 million investigations done every year and on average, killing more than 5 children every day. The main issue of child abuse is that the abuser is usually someone a child loves or depends on (a parent, sibling, coach, neighbor, etc.), who violates child’s trust putting personal interests first, therefore official numbers of how many children suffer maltreatment might be not accurate enough as remarkable amount of these cases go unreported. Each case of child abuse is unique, with a lot of individual factors involved, nevertheless, we can distinguish some of the common causes, such as poverty, lack of education, depression, mental or physical health

Child welfare systems typically receive and investigate reports of possible child abuse and neglect; provide services to families that need assistance in the protection and care of their children; arrange for children to live with foster families when they are not safe at home; and arrange for reunification, adoption, or other permanent family connections for children leaving foster care.When you look up what the Child welfare system it says,

Child abuse is when a parent or caregiver, through action or failure to act, causes injury, death, emotional harm or risk of serious harm to a child. According to The Federal Child Abuse Prevention and Treatment Act, as amended by the CAPTA Reauthorization Act of 2010, at a minimum, child abuse and neglect is defined as, "Any recent act or failure to act on the part of a parent or caretaker which results in death, serious physical or emotional harm, sexual abuse or exploitation"; or "An act or failure to act which presents an imminent risk of serious harm (Children 's Bureau, 2010)." The law recognizes a child as being any person who is under the age of 18. The law is broken into 2 sections, and each section treats the idea of child maltreatment in different ways. Criminally, those who abuse children are able to be arrested and prosecuted in court. Civil statutes say that people who suspect a child of being abused are mandated to identify and report it.

When children come into the custody of DCFS and are placed into Foster Care they are scared, confused, lonely, and usually conditioned not to tell when they are being mistreated. Most of the children that come into “the system” have learned to accept abuse as normal or natural and are unaware that they are even being mistreated. Therefore, when they are placed in homes where this is occurring it is not in their nature to speak up. Once they are removed from their parents, they are solely reliant on the department for their protection and it is the department’s responsibility to provide that protection which has not always been fulfilled by the department or the foster care agencies. The department should be making reasonable efforts to provide proper services

The Department for Education is in charge of youngster’s assurance in England. It sets out legislation's, policies and statutory way on how the child protection framework needs to work. The Local Safeguarding Children Board (LSCBs) co-ordinate, and guarantee the adequacy of, work to ensure and promote the welfare/safety of children.

The Indian Child Welfare Act of 1978 (ICWA), Pub L 95-608; 25 USC 1901-1963, is a federal law that protects Indians children from unwarranted removal of their tribes (USC 1901-1963). This federal law was in response to the high number of Indian children being removed from their tribal homes by social services and placed in non-tribal homes. Despite this federal mandate, many states and local counties continue to struggle in complying with the regulations of ICWA. Historically, in comparison to the general population, a very high percentage of Indian children have been removed unwarranted and a very high percent of such Indian children have been placed in non-Indian foster (National Indian Welfare Association, n.d). For example, a 1976

By the year 1967, all U.S. states had child abuse reporting laws. “Child abuse reporting laws and enhanced awareness of child abuse produced an increase in intervention” (Myers, 2013). As reporting laws came into affect, more and more cases of child abuse and neglect were shown. By the mid 1970s, over 60,000 child abuse cases were reported and the extremely high rate of children in foster care alarmed government officials. In 1980, the Adoption Assistance and Child Welfare Act (AACWA) was passed. This act required every state to make reasonable efforts in keeping children with their families, and when removing the child was not avoidable, the child was required to have a plan to be placed back in the home or have their parents’ rights revoked. For the children whom returning home was not an option, Congress offered financial incentives for adoption. This effort to preserve the families was a main objective of AACWA. An influential investigation pertaining to this was done by Henry S. Mass and Richard E. Engler, as explained by Sribnick (2011). They concluded that many children were living a majority of their childhood years in foster care and institutions. Their findings showed that if a child stayed in foster care for more than a year and a half, it was not likely that he or she would ever be reunited with his or her family or be adopted. In response to this, the Child Welfare League of America lobbied for child welfare workers to consider

It is important to examine where the laws come from and why they are in place. Generally, the laws are defined as a parent or guardian’s inability to protect his/her children from witnessing domestic violence or being abused by another person (Goodmark, 2004). When a child is exposed to domestic violence that can be considered a form of child neglect, even if the child is not harmed. This includes seeing, hearing, or simply witnessing the aftereffects of violence, such as an injured victim (Child Welfare Information Gateway, 2012). While this is a large part of the laws, they are mainly in place to protect children from experiencing firsthand abuse. The Child Abuse Prevention and Treatment Act (CAPTA) was enacted in 1974 and designed to give a clear definition of child abuse, which failure to protect laws use as a basis to determine if a woman should be charged with abuse or neglect. CAPTA defines abuse as “any recent act or failure to act on the part of a parent or caretaker, which results in death, serious physical or emotional harm, sexual abuse or exploitation, or an act or failure to act which presents an imminent risk of serious harm” (“The Child Abuse Prevention and Treatment Act,” 2003). Failure to protect laws use the aspect of CAPTA that considers “failure to act” a part of child abuse. Because women fail to act in protecting their children or stopping the abuser, they can be charged.

Child welfare officials are obligated to provide children who have suffered from abuse or neglect with appropriate homes. Unfortunately, The Children’s Rights Organization reveals that there were 4 million reports of child maltreatment in the United States. Based on the overall results, the data concludes that more than 78 percent of the perpetrators of maltreatment were parents acting alone, together, or with other individuals (“Child Abuse and Neglect” 1). When children are removed from their home and placed in foster care, it is also assumed that the children are no longer in danger. Parents who lack training and compassion end up maltreating the children.

In the article “Should More Be Done to Protect Children”, Judith W. Meltzer, deputy director for the Center for Study of Social Policy in Washington, D.C., clarifies that “New Jersey spent around one billion dollars between 2003 and 2008 to hire and train social workers, updating its computer tracking system, recruiting more foster parents and expanding services for families” (Lyons 3). Indeed, Meltzer is determined to improve the child welfare systems in her area. In similarity, Mark Testa, co-director of the University of Illinois’ Children and Family Research Center, concluded the same compromise as Judith W. Meltzer. For example, Testa writes in the article “Will Recent Changes Make At-Risk Children Safer?” that “Illinois has been transformed

Child welfare services Child welfare systems include a range of services (for example, family-based services, child protection, out-of-home placements, adoption services), encompassing prevention, intervention, and treatment. Services are intended to protect children and their well-being, strengthen families, and provide permanency when children cannot safely remain with their families. Child welfare services should be strength based; family centered; trauma informed; and respectful of a family’s culture, values, customs, beliefs, and needs

Forensic social work is the application of social work to questions and issues relating to law and legal systems (Sheehan, 2011) Although it may not be heard of as much, forensic social work has been embedded around since early 20th century. There are many different connections of social work practices that can go along with forensic social work, however, child welfare is, without a doubt, an aspect of social work that has been an ongoing and current trend in Forensic Social Work. Different aspects of child welfare include any type of child maltreatment. A few examples that are commonly brought up is child custody issues, neglect, and child abuse. Forensic social work has been incorporated within Child Welfare since Child Welfare has developed into what it is