Social Policy Analysis

Running head: CHILD PHYSICAL ABUSE 1

CHILD PHYSICAL ABUSE 5

Child Protection Policy- CAPTA and Child Services

Washburn O Kelly

Western Kentucky University

Dr. April Murphy

April 6, 2019

Child Protection Policy- CAPTA and Child Services

Child Physical physical Abuse abuse is a societal issue with approximately 700, 000 children facing abuse every year in the country. Both the federal and state governments are addressing this issue. The federal government provides guidelines on the reporting of child abuse and protection of abused children (Child Welfare Information Gateway, 2018). The federal government offers definitions which have allowed all states to define civil and criminal about domestic violence and provided guidelines on the protection of children and other family members from physical abuse. Physical abuse entails infliction of pain or injury on the child. The Federal Child Abuse Prevention and Treatment Act (CAPTA) was formulated to ensure that children remain protected under the child services program (the United States, 2014). Comment by Author: I think you might be missing a word after “criminal” ? Comment by Author: APA

Goals Comment by Author: This section is written kind of choppy – work on improving the flow. Also, in this section you started to give your evaluation of the policy. Hold that stuff for the final section. For example, “the goal is too broad…” – this is your opinion/assessment of the policy. There is room for this later. In this section just address the explicit and implicit (latent) goals, objectives, and whether client perspectives were taken into account.

The primary goal of CAPTA is to provide safety, permanence, and well-being to children and youth. In foster care and adopted families. The government has agency-specific protocols that offer guidance on the reporting of incidents, prevention of abuse, and training for volunteers and staff (CAPTA Reauthorization, 2018). The policy has set a high standard in the protection of children against abuse. An achievable goal from the policy is offering shelter to cases that it receives of physically abused children or youth. The goal is too broad, and the government may not be able to provide services to all children since children are different and their needs may not be within the organization's ability to manage. This is a latent goal of the organization. Some of the children have special needs while others come from different backgrounds. These issues make it hard for the one size-fits-all approach in the provision of services. Also, some of the cases do not reach them because no one reports these issues due to fear from the children and parents who do not trust the organization to provide the required services. This limits the effectiveness of CAPTA (Child Abuse & Neglect). However, the policy manages to take the perspective of the clients into consideration during its formulation. The goals and objectives are specific to ensure that the client will receive safety, permanence, and well-being. Comment by Author: Not a complete sentence Comment by Author: How so? Based on what evidence?

Benefits and Services Comment by Author: Might want to look at the document found here: https://www.childwelfare.gov/pubPDFs/about.pdf or https://www.everycrsreport.com/reports/R40899.html

CAPTA provides protection services to all physically abused or neglected children (Rhodes, 2015). The policy does not have any societal barriers. It welcomes all children who face challenges from at home due to neglect and abuse from their parents, guardians or anyone with the mandate to protect them. However, child services do not provide efficient solutions to for guardians and parents who physically abuse their children. Child services do not offer a solution to for preventing the abuse of children. Instead, they offer the children protection and necessary services to allow them to get back to their healthy lives. The clients, children, and youth receive all the benefits from CAPTA (Covey, 2018). They receive the proper counseling and training on how to cope with their conditions and what to do when faced with such situations. The placement of children with families or guardians who can provide them with the appropriate care that the children need does not offer a lot of consumer choice. Most of the children get to go to homes they are allocated due to the fear of being alone. Child services are, however, limited in the provision of services through its funding as it can only provide services as through its financial capabilities. The services provided are not entirely beneficial to children as some of them end up in homes that they do not like or are not accepted by those that who are already in the homes. The number of positive outcomes from children services is, therefore, limited. Also, the placement of children in homes considers the strengths and resources of the community. Comment by Author: What about family preservation services, etc.? Comment by Author: ? Comment by Author: Sentence structure Comment by Author: This is not sufficient – what evidence do you have?

Eligibility Rules Comment by Author: Need to add a bit to this section – CAPTA also provides services to children and families who may not have substantiated cases of maltreatment, but also those who have been assessed as needing support. Check out those documents I provided links to above.

The provision of services is only accessible to children and youth who face physical abuse and neglect from their parents or guardians (Child Welfare Information Gateway). The organization only requires evidence that the child is under abuse to provide services. There is no eligibility other than the evidence of abuse. The provision of services to the children and youth is based on equality, fairness, and the guidelines for the organization. However, the eligibility rules are not able to create incentives for the clients to meet their own needs since their ability is limited to their age (Shelton, & Colón, 2010). The example of verbal and emotional abuse creates an issue when it comes to eligibility due to the lack of a measure to substantiate how much abuse is done. There are limited ways for a teen or child to face abuse without outside help. In some cases, positive steps have led to the termination of children services for a child. This happens when the parent or guardian stops the abuse and proves that it will not continue or when a child is successfully adopted into a new home. Comment by Author: APA

Service Delivery System

The provision of services to physically abused children occurs through employees and volunteers from child services. Child services have branches all over the country. The organization can deliver services in all the states through both social workers and caseworkers. While caseworkers have the mandate to offer services to each child, social workers assist in more specific areas like coping with new environments. The organization builds on assets that already exist in the community. These assets include wiling families that are willing to adopt and reports on child abuse. The provision of services can happen when a child is in dire need of protection, and the organization can offer it despite the location of the child (Kennedy, 2015). The provision of services happens in various ways and finding suitable families for children is among them. Children and youth may receive information about available foster homes and have agency in choosing for themselves whether they would want to live with a particular family. The laws guiding child services ensures that all its volunteers and workers get proper training on how to handle children in their care and abusive parents as well as potential families and sponsors before they offer services. Ethics is a guiding principle for the organization, and all employees are required to be professional and behave ethically (Herman-Smith, 2013). The services are available to clients from all races and ethnicity since the organization is available across the country. Comment by Author: I don’t know that this is a factual statement – do you have something to support this? Comment by Author: This is a good start, but you want to provide some sources to back up what you are saying. Also, there is more to this than just willing families – look at some programs that have received funding from CAPTA – how are they building on the strengths and resources in the community? Comment by Author: So do you think this happens? Comment by Author: Sentence structure Comment by Author: I’m not sure how this fits here.

Financing Comment by Author: Use the linked documents provided – it will help you more fully develop this section.

The organization receives its funding from the federal government (Federal Funds Dedicated to Child Abuse Prevention). Under its enactment, the government is responsible for providing the necessary funding to ensure that the children are taken care of during their stay with child services. All employees with child services are under employment with the government. The government reimburses service providers through salaries. Social workers are mainly involved in the provision of these services, and they are under employment with the federal government (National Association of Social Workers, 2012). Due to underfunding, child services face a lot of issues in providing proper services to the children and youth. Cost-effectiveness in the organization is a significant issue in the organization since the organization must look for ways of providing better services to the children despite the limited funds that the government provides to the department. Comment by Author: APA Comment by Author: What does this have to do with CAPTA Comment by Author: Not all CPS workers are social workers – they may be social service workers, but not social workers Comment by Author: What about the privatization of services?

References

CAPTA Reauthorization. (2018, February 12). Retrieved from https://www.ncsc.org/services-and-experts/government-relations/child-welfare/capta-reauthorization.aspx

Child Abuse & Neglect. (n.d.). Retrieved from https://www.acf.hhs.gov/cb/focus-areas/child-abuse-neglect

Child Welfare Information Gateway. (2018). Definitions of domestic violence. Washington, DC: U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, Children’s Bureau.

Child Welfare Information Gateway. (n.d.). About CAPTA: A Legislative History. Retrieved from https://www.childwelfare.gov/pubs/factsheets/about/

Covey, H. C. (2018). The smallest victims: A history of child maltreatment and child protection in America. Santa Barbara, California: Praeger, an imprint of ABC-CLIO, LLC.

Federal Funds Dedicated to Child Abuse Prevention. (n.d.). Retrieved from https://www.childwelfare.gov/topics/management/funding/program-areas/prevention/federal/federal-funds/

Herman-Smith, R. L. (January 01, 2013). Early Childhood Interventionists' Perceptions of the Child Abuse Prevention and Treatment Act: Provider Characteristics and Organizational Climate. Early Education and Development, 24, 3, 393-407.

Kennedy, A. (2015). Federal child welfare programs: Overview and funding. New York: Nova Publishers.

National Association of Social Workers. (2012). Social workers and child abuse reporting: A review of state mandatory reporting requirements. Washington D. C.: NASW Press.

Rhodes, V. (2015). Child abuse and neglect: National maltreatment data and state statutes. New York: Nova Publishers.

Shelton, P. Y., & Colón, R. (2010). Child of the civil rights movement. New York: Schwartz & Wade Books.

The United States. (2014). The federal child protection laws sourcebook. Chicago, Illinois: American Bar Association.