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Addressing Parental ACEs in the Child Welfare System in Weld County, Colorado

In Weld County, Colorado, 5.5 out of every 1,000 children experienced out-of-home placement in 2018 due to involvement with the child welfare system for concerns of abuse or neglect (CO Children’s Campaign, 2020). When a child is placed into a home other than that of their nuclear family, it inflicts trauma on the whole family unit (Casey Family Programs, 2018). One significant predictor of the perpetration of child abuse is the parent having experienced abuse as a child (Anderson et al., 2018). Therefore, a need exists to address the trauma experienced by the parents as well as the children. In these situations, children often have Court Appointed Special Advocates (CASAs) who are dedicated to getting to know the child and advocating in Court for their best interests (Voices for CASA children, 2022). At times, parents in these cases lack support and advocacy to this depth. In many cases, parents who find themselves involved with the Child Welfare system have experienced their own trauma and have not had the resources to deal with it and build the resilience necessary to prevent their children from experiencing the same types of trauma but are nonetheless required to perform tasks that may only cover the symptoms rather than address the true issue of trauma (Casey Family Programs, 2018 & Jaggi et al., 2022). These parents need a resource who can come alongside them to help them identify and deal with the parts of their past that are continuing to impact their family.

This project will operate at the community and relationship levels of the Center for Disease Control and Prevention’s (CDC’s) Social Ecological Model (CDC, 2022). The community level of this model includes settings in an area where people access services, recreate, or congregate including social service organizations. By embedding this service in the child welfare agency, we will see results at this level. The relationship level includes close relationships a person has such as family and close friends. The relationship the parent develops with the service provider will ideally become a close relationship with great influence in that person’s life. The close relationships of the parent involved with the child welfare system, such as their immediate family relationships, will be impacted tremendously by this project as the goal will be to strengthen these very relationships.

Using the trauma-informed principles of safety, empowerment, trustworthiness and transparency. Acknowledging and seeking to alleviate the power differential that naturally exists in child welfare between the parent and the service provider will also be vitally important to this program's success and trauma-informed principles will be applies towards this end as well so that genuine partnerships with parents can be developed which will lead to more successful outcomes for families.

A public health framework that works toward systems-level change is the most effective for causing widespread change among the highest numbers of people to see a reduction in a public health issue throughout the population (Philanthropy Network, 2016). Initially, this project works at a tertiary level since parents who are already experiencing involvement with child welfare are the recipients of services, making primary prevention impossible. However, as time goes on, and project goals are realized, it will also work at the secondary level of prevention by impacting the children of these parents who are at risk for future involvement with child welfare. This program aims to reduce the incidence of continued generational involvement with child welfare by helping parents to work through their trauma so they in turn can help their children avoid additional trauma and build resilience to protect them against the potential negative impacts of trauma in their adulthood. Enabling families to build resilience within the family unit will hopefully lead to fewer families struggling with the effects of trauma throughout the community.

References

Anderson, R. E., Edwards, L. J., Silver, K. E. & Johnson, D. M. (2018). Intergenerational transmission of child abuse: Predictors of child abuse potential among racially diverse women residing in domestic violence shelters. Child Abuse & Neglect 85(80-90). doi: 10.1016/j.chiabu.2018.08.004. Epub 2018 Aug 28.

Casey Family Programs. (2018, May 29). How can investigation, removal, and placement processes be more trauma-informed? Casey.org. https://www.casey.org/trauma-i...n-removal-placement/.

Casey Family Programs. (2018, May 25). Why should child protection agencies become trauma-informed? Casey.org. https://www.casey.org/why-become-trauma-informed/.

Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. (2022, January 18). The social ecological model: A framework for prevention. CDC. https://www.cdc.gov/violencepr...ecologicalmodel.html.

Colorado Children’s Campaign. (2020, August 25). Weld county data – 2020 county fact sheet. Colorado Kids. https://www.coloradokids.org/d...0-county-fact-sheet/.

Colorado Department of Human Services. (2019, January 10). Concerns about child abuse and neglect in Colorado continue to rise. CDHS. https://cdhs.colorado.gov/pres...ado-continue-to-rise.

Crits-Christoph, P., Rieger, A., Gaines, A., Connolly Gibbons, M. B. (2019). Trust and respect in the patient-clinician relationship: Preliminary development of a new scale. BioMed Central Psychology 7(91). doi: 10.1186/s40359-019-0347-3.

Jaggi, L., Jaramilla, J., Drazkowski, T. K., & Seker, S. (2022). Child welfare involvement and adjustment among care alumni and their children: A systematic review of risk and protective factors. Child Abuse & Neglect 131. doi: 10.1016/j.chiabu.2022.105776.

Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration. SAMHSA’s Concept of Trauma and Guidance for a Trauma-Informed Approach. HHS Publication No. (SMA) 14-4884. Rockville, MD: Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration, 2014.

Philanthropy Network Greater Philadelphia, Thomas Scattergood Behavioral Health Foundation, and United Way of Greater Philadelphia and Southern New Jersey. (2016). Trauma Informed Philanthropy: A Funder’s Resource Guide for Supporting Trauma-Informed Practice in the Delaware Valley. https://philanthropynetwork.org/sites/default/files/TraumaGUIDE_Final.pdf

Voices for CASA Children. (2022). What is a CASA? Voices for CASA Children. https://voicesforcasachildren.org/what-is-a-casa/.

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