By now, it is pretty much common knowledge that Latinos comprise the nation's largest minority group, both as a percentage of the population (17.6 percent) and as a percentage of school-age students (25 percent). That is, one in four K-12 students in the United States is Latino or Latina. While the related challenges are often overemphasized, the…

Objective: Organizational climate has emerged as an important factor in understanding and addressing the complexities of providing services in child welfare. This research examines the psychometric properties of each of the dimensions of Parker and colleagues' Psychological Climate Survey in a sample of voluntary child welfare workers. Methods:…

Objective: This research examines the psychometric properties of the Perceptions of Child Welfare Scale (PCWS). This instrument is designed to assess child welfare workers' understanding of how society views their role and their work. Methods: Confirmatory factor analysis (CFA) was utilized to analyze data on 538 child welfare workers. Results:…

Strengths-based practice (SBP) is one of the primary modalities of social work practice. The literature on SBP does not address a standardized tool for measuring SBP or whether receipt of a social work degree is related to practice orientation. We measure SBP with a provider-based Strengths-Based Practices Inventory (SBPI-P) and examine whether a…

The actuarial method is the gold standard for risk assessment in child welfare, juvenile justice, and criminal justice. It produces risk classifications that are highly predictive and that may be robust to sampling error. This article reports a revalidation study of the Arizona Risk/Needs Assessment instrument, an actuarial instrument for juvenile…

This population-based study investigated the unique and cumulative relations between risks that are monitored by public surveillance systems and academic and behavioral outcomes for an entire cohort of third graders in a large, urban public school system. Using integrated, administrative records from child welfare, public health, housing, and…

Citizen Review Panels (CRPs) for Child Protective Services are groups of citizen-volunteers throughout the United States who are federally mandated to evaluate local and state child protection systems. This study presents a profile of 332 CRP members in 20 states with regards to their demographic information, length of time on the panel, and …

This study report provides information about kinship foster care and foster family care focusing on the demographic characteristics of the providers; the services providers receive; the children served in care; and issues of visitation with birth parents. The study highlights marked differences in providers and in the services they receive, and…

Fifty-six Delaware families who had adopted special needs children were interviewed concerning the adoptions and family support systems. A majority of the children were adopted by White foster families who were adaptable, close-knit, and active in their church. Recommendations are made to increase the likelihood of adoptions for special needs…

Examined the mortality rate in a one-year cohort of children with child welfare status in Alberta. Found the rate to be significantly elevated compared to children not in care. Neglected and abused children were apt to have died violently, while handicapped children were more likely to have died because of disease or infirmity. (HTH)

Reviews statistics on children in foster care. Examines the definition of foster care, the reasons children are placed in foster care, the various living arrangements that constitute foster care, and the rapid growth of the foster care population. (MDM)

Explores the forces that will influence the number of children in foster care needing adoption and the number of families seeking to adopt in the next century. These forces are likely to challenge current policy and practice and place greater demands on the child welfare system that should be approached through a supply-and-demand perspective.…

To determine how the Internet is being used in education, researchers surveyed newsgroup participants. Questions concerned demographics and usage. Responses totaled 147. Results indicate that there is a solid foundation of users who are optimistic about the future despite hardware and software problems and concerns about offensive material. Seven…

Notes increasing demands that foster care be incorporated into the formal economy as a professional salaried service. Examines some of the developments that lie behind those demands and discusses their implications. (HTH)

Poverty rates increased in the early 1990s, but between 1994 and 1999 the metro child poverty rate declined 6 percentage points and the nonmetro rate declined 4 percent. In 1999, the poverty rate for nonmetro Black children was about double that of nonmetro White children, but the Black-White gap in poverty narrowed between 1985 and 1999. (TD)