The Key Concepts Of Social Work In The Child Welfare
System
The Child Welfare System The child welfare system is a complex system that
requires a special skill set for social workers. Among this set of skills includes
sensitivity, compassion, mature judgment, and an advanced knowledge of social
work (Farley, Smith, Boyle, 2011). Since the child welfare system is so diverse,
social workers must work with four important elements, which are the family, the
extended family, the community, and a specialized team of family preservation
specialists (Farley et al., 2011). When working in the child welfare system, social
workers must keep permanency and stability as the primary objectives, no matter
which division of social work he is working in (Farley et al., 2011). In home care,
foster care, adoption, and child protective services are the main divisions of the
child welfare system, and the social worker plays a critical role in each of these
divisions, since each division is related to the others in some capacity.
In Home Care In home care is one of the main divisions of social work, and it
primarily entails looking at the relationship between the child and his environment.
Social workers involved in this field often must interact with the parents, helping to
teach them parenting and listening skills (Farley et al., 2011). Often times, the
social worker borrows principles from the cognitive behavioral therapy and adopts
a problem solving strategy when working with the family (Farley et al., 2011). If
these programs are performed effectively and efficiently, they help keep children
with their biological families, so they do not have to enter foster care, and programs
that include IFPS are the most effective in preventing out of home placements (Farley
et al., 2011).
Foster Care Perhaps one of the most well known divisions of the child welfare
system is foster care, which is a type arrangement for children to live outside of
their homes. Foster care typically is short term, and it may result in the child
returning to his parents to receive in home care, or the child may be adopted (Farley
et al., 2011). Unfortunately, many children in foster care have experienced some type
of trauma in addition to being removed from their home and their family (Kramer,
Sigel,