Epilogue

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Megan Birk
Keyword(s):  
Child Care ◽  
Foster Care ◽  
Child Welfare ◽  
Progressive Era ◽  
Foster Children ◽  
Foster Parents ◽  
Family Preservation ◽  
Dependent Child ◽  
Care Policy ◽  
Child Welfare Policy

This epilogue examines how changes in child welfare policy were affected by the decline of the farm home as a symbol of American prosperity, the appropriate levels of work and education for children, the expense of placement, the problems with supervision, and efforts at family preservation. It explains how the decisions made during the Progressive Era to rationalize, study, centralize, and professionalize institutionalization and placement permanently altered the methods of care for dependent children throughout the country. It suggests that the farm placement system changed in part because the farm itself was in transition, and that foster care was also unsuccessful in ways similar to the practice it was purported to replace. Finally, it considers problems with dependent child care policy that persist until today, in which foster children are trapped in a web of bureaucracy that undermines conscientious foster parents from being able to parent.

Introduction

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Megan Birk
Keyword(s):  
Child Care ◽  
Foster Care ◽  
Child Welfare ◽  
World War I ◽  
Family Preservation ◽  
World War ◽  
Dependent Child ◽  
Dependent Children ◽  
Number Of Children ◽  
Farm Life

This book investigates how the practice of placing children with farmers in the rural Midwest that lasted from the early decades of the 1800s until after World War I eventually fell out of favor as a matter of policy. It explores the problems of abuse, neglect, and overwork that some children faced once they went into placement homes, along with efforts to remedy the problems with farm placements. It also considers how Progressive efforts at studying child welfare and farm life further cast doubts on the wisdom of farm placements and free placements in general. The book attributes the rise and fall of farm placements as a reflection of an important series of changes in dependent child care; between the 1870s and 1920s, farm placements for dependent children increased alongside the number of children institutionalized. However, problems with farms and farm placements forced reformers to discard this method in favor of paid foster care, adoptions, and family preservation. This introduction provides an overview of the chapters that follow.

Foster Care Outcomes for Children With Intellectual Disability

2016 ◽  
Vol 54 (5) ◽  
pp. 299-315 ◽  
Author(s):  
Elspeth M. Slayter
Keyword(s):  
Intellectual Disability ◽  
Foster Care ◽  
Child Welfare ◽  
Foster Children ◽  
National Study ◽  
Cross Sectional ◽  
Child Welfare Policy ◽  
Care Outcomes ◽  
Outcomes For Children ◽  
Children With Intellectual Disability

Abstract The promotion of speedy, permanent outcomes for foster children is a central child welfare policy goal. However, while children with intellectual disability (ID) are at greater risk for child welfare involvement, little is known about their case outcomes. This cross-sectional national study explores between-group foster care outcomes. Foster children with intellectual disability were more likely to have experienced an adoption disruption or dissolution but less likely to be reunified with a parent, primary caretaker or other family member. Implications for interagency collaboration in support of pre and post-foster care discharge support services are discussed.

Foster Care in a Life Course Perspective

2020 ◽  
Vol 692 (1) ◽  
pp. 227-252
Author(s):  
Fred Wulczyn
Keyword(s):  
Foster Care ◽  
Life Course ◽  
Social Services ◽  
Foster Children ◽  
Foster Parents ◽  
Local Variation ◽  
Life Course Perspective ◽  
State And Local ◽  
Policy Priority ◽  
The Life Course

To understand what placement outside of one’s home means to the young people involved, we must understand foster care from a life course perspective. I analyze young people’s experiences in foster care from this perspective, accounting for when foster care happens, how long it lasts, and what happens when foster care placements end. I show that the population of children coming into foster care is younger and less urban than it was 20 years ago. I also show reliable measures of exposure to foster care over the life course. Children who enter care early in life are the children who spend the largest proportion of their childhood in foster care—a fact that rarely weighs on the policymaking process. We know very little about state and local variation in foster care placement rates, not to mention the influence of social services, the courts, foster parents, and caseworkers over foster children, so I close by arguing investment in research should be a clear policy priority.

The U.S. Children's Bureau and Infant Mortality in the Progressive Era

1995 ◽  
Vol 177 (3) ◽  
pp. 57-69 ◽  
Author(s):  
Kriste Lindenmeyer
Keyword(s):  
Child Welfare ◽  
Infant Mortality ◽  
Progressive Era ◽  
Infant Mortality Rate ◽  
Child Welfare Policy ◽  
High Infant Mortality ◽  
Diagnostic Work ◽  
National Effort ◽  
The U.S

Early in the twentieth century, a growing child welfare movement led to the establishment of the first federal agency in the world, the U.S. Children's Bureau, designated to investigate and report on the circumstances of children. Appointed in 1912, the agency's first director, Julia Lathrop, focused on infant mortality, beginning with a year's study in Johnstown, Pennsylvania. The work stimulated a national effort to “save babies.” The Bureau's efforts led to the Sheppard-Towner Act of 1921, which funded educational and diagnostic work to lower the nation's high infant mortality rate. But this type of effort was short-lived. The article describes the course of the agency's work in the Progressive Era and evaluates its effect on current child welfare policy, a key area in the ongoing controversy over “welfare reform” and the role of the federal government in the provision of human services.

The Hard-to-Place Child

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Catherine E. Rymph
Keyword(s):  
African American ◽  
Foster Care ◽  
Attachment Theory ◽  
New Deal ◽  
Foster Children ◽  
Foster Parents ◽  
Conventional Wisdom ◽  
Child Placement ◽  
American Children ◽  
Post War

This chapter examines the notion of the “hard-to-place child” and the post-war emergence of the idea that foster children were inherently damaged. This idea derived from the rise of “attachment theory” and the conventional wisdom that New Deal family security programs had effectively eliminated poverty as a reason for child placement, thereby meaning that those children still in need of foster care came from pathological families. The chapter looks at various qualities that made a child “hard-to-place,” including, age, disability, behavioural problems, and race. It looks specifically at the use of board rates as a strategy to recruit foster parents and at efforts to recruit African American foster homes to serve African American children.

“The right of the state to interfere is unquestioned”

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Megan Birk
Keyword(s):  
Child Care ◽  
Foster Care ◽  
Institutional Care ◽  
The State ◽  
Dependent Child ◽  
Dependent Children ◽  
The Right

This chapter examines efforts to remedy the problems with farm placements. It looks at the state boards of charity, visiting agents, and courts as examples of methods used to improve placing out. As the state boards worked to legitimize their expertise and county officials tried to improve the care given to dependent children, work remained to standardize care and encourage placements. State boards recommended a second initiative in addition to better oversight of institutional care to secure more placement homes and supervision for children: hiring state visiting agents to supervise placed-out children. This chapter explores how the two-pronged issue of mistreatment of children in placement homes and the resulting efforts to increase supervision ultimately forced placers and visitors to make a number of proposals, including a return of direct aid and more involvement by the courts. It also considers the rise in paid foster care and how it affected all facets of dependent child care.

scholarly journals IS FOSTER CARE THE SAFE PLACE WE BELIEVE IT TO BE? IF NOT, WHY NOT?

2021 ◽  
Vol 57 (4) ◽  
pp. 499-515
Author(s):  
Rankwe Reuben Masha ◽  
Petro Botha
Keyword(s):  
Foster Care ◽  
Child Protection ◽  
Foster Children ◽  
Foster Parents ◽  
Small Scale ◽  
Research Approach ◽  
Foster Care System ◽  
Safe Place ◽  
Children In Foster Care ◽  
Abuse And Neglect

Foster care is an important part of the child protection system; however, it seems that some foster children are not protected – they are abused and neglected. The aims of this article are to confirm on a small scale whether children in foster care are indeed being abused and neglected and to develop an understanding of factors contributing to the abuse and neglect of these foster children. A qualitative research approach was applied. Findings confirmed the occurrence of abuse and/or neglect and provided information on factors relating to foster parents and the foster care system itself contributing to this phenomenon.

Health Services for California's Foster Children: Current Practices and Policy Recommendations

PEDIATRICS ◽  
1987 ◽  
Vol 80 (2) ◽  
pp. 183-191
Author(s):  
Neal Halfon ◽  
Linnea Klee
Keyword(s):  
Health Care ◽  
Foster Care ◽  
Child Welfare ◽  
Health Services ◽  
Health Care Providers ◽  
Foster Children ◽  
Health Care Use ◽  
Policy Recommendations ◽  
Care Providers ◽  
Children In Foster Care

The organization and delivery of health services to children in foster care was investigated in 14 California counties in 1985. Foster care administrators, child welfare workers, foster parents, and health care providers responded to questionnaires and structured interviews performed by two pediatricians knowledgeable about the child welfare system. The organization of health services demonstrated a high degree of variability between counties. Although some counties initially evaluate all dependent children using specific protocols and examinations sites, more often services were poorly organized, fragmented, and had few safeguards to ensure delivery of appropriate health care. Use of recommended Early Periodic Screening Diagnosis and Treatment services was also variable, and counties could not provide documentation of use rates by foster children. Even less consistent was the performance of routine initial mental health assessments. Financial disincentives, fewer available providers, difficulties in obtaining and using Medicaid-reimbursed services, and fragmentation of services were frequently identified as barriers to access. To improve the organization and delivery of services, access barriers must be diminished, services must be better organized and integrated, and new financing mechanisms must be developed. Specific policy recommendations are presented.

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