Resources Database

From Faith to Action provides an introduction to family and community-based care for orphans and vulnerable children as an alternative to institutional care, highlighting key strategies that help children remain in families.

The Global Social Service Workforce Alliance held three sessions at the REPSSI Regional Psychosocial Support Initiative 2015 Forum on planning, developing and supporting para professional social service workers.

This series of tools and resources developed over five years has proven effective in strengthening the OVC response in Lesotho.

In preparation for the Expert Meeting on Alternative Care and Family Support in the Baltic Sea Region - held in Tallinn, Estonia in May 2015 - the Children’s Unit in cooperation with the Expert Group for Cooperation on Children at Risk conducted a mapping of family support and alternative care services in the Baltic Sea Region Member States in order to analyze the situation, assess the achievements since the 2005 Ministerial Forum and to identify relevant opportunities and challenges for the future by: (1) Identifying effective interventions to prevent children from being separated from the

This paper presents a policy position which argues that, “as the Greek authorities map out the road to long-term recovery, several key steps to reform the child protection and care system should be taken as a matter of priority.” These reforms of the child protection and care systems are vital, say the authors, not only as a human rights issue, but also because they make economic sense.

This booklet was developed by Mamelani Projects, a community development organization in South Africa. The booklet outlines Mamelani’s approach to Youth Development and providing transitional support to young people as they transition out of Child and Youth Care Centres (CYCCs). This booklet is designed to be used by practitioners - such as child and youth care workers, social workers and program managers - who work directly with youth who are transitioning from residential care.

The importance of child protection as well as the designated social workers (DSWs) assigned to them, and the jeopardy they face, is well recognized. Although there is a call to enhance DSW resilience, little is known about their resilience, and there are no guidelines to equip South African DSW supervisors to promote supervisee resilience. This article proposes resilience-enhancing guidelines for South African DSWs within reflective supervision.

Little is known about how the knowledge, attitudes, and behaviors of the public child welfare workforce influence implementation of evidence-based practice (EBP) as most research has focused on the private workforce. This paper reports on public child welfare staff knowledge, attitudes, and practices in a state implementing the EBP, SafeCare^®.

The Department of Social Welfare administers several social transfer schemes for low-income and vulnerable individuals and families, including the Care and Protection Allowance for children. This report examines levels of child poverty and vulnerability in the country, and reviews key policy and design issues, the operations of the Care and Protection Allowance, as well as its impact on recipients. The report makes recommendations to strengthen its implementation and further develop Fiji’s national social protection system.

This article reviews the challenges of social work education and practice in the Asian and Pacific regions and suggests possible steps to realize the goals of the global agenda in the context of those countries.

This report is a compilation of input from leaders and universities in 28 U.S. states and counties. The group outlined pressing issues facing the child welfare workforce and strategies for developing the workforce to address these issues.

This paper reviews the creation and implementation of an online peer network for social work traineeship student pursuing or continuing careers in child welfare. The paper includes a literature review of best principles and practices for facilitating an online community.

As technology changes, so too, does its use within social work. This paper review both challenges and opportunities of digital communication on social work practice.

This study examines the views of stakeholders related to factors that influence career choices and retention of community mental health workers in Ghana. Those working in the field cited the positive reasons as well as challenges.

Organizations and individuals working with vulnerable children need to consider the rights of vulnerable children when using photos, stories and other information in social media and digital content. This study is a review of ethical standards.

This report is a literature review that found that strengthening health services at the community-level, services integration and training the workforce to improve service delivery, including social services, has reduced mobidity and mortality and led to an uptick in healthy behaviors.

Service providers experience victim resistance as a significant barrier to the successful provision of services. Complex trauma from abuse in both trafficking situations and family of origin, plays a significant role in victim resistance. These results discuss the need for continue dialogue and consideration of victim resistance in the design and implementation of services.

This paper reports the development of a new measure of self-efficacy for both direct practice and indirect practice and a review of the literature on self-efficacy. Worker self-efficacy can be used to identify vulnerable workers who may be especially in need of strong supervisory support as well as understand who to target for recruitment.

Innovative approaches that mitigate the obstacles to engaging parents in child welfare are reviewed in this report and include recommendations on the role of the child welfare worker.

This review focuses on child protection training that takes place during continuing professional education in order to improve reporting of child abuse and neglect.