Suchergebnisse

The number of children in foster care remains high, and most disturbing are the numbers of children whose abuse continues after system intervention. Faced by these challenges, child welfare legislation and policy have shifted away from the earlier standard of "reasonable efforts" toward reunification for children in foster care to a standard in which "the best interests of the child" have priority. The new goal calls for greater use of assessment tools in locating those families deemed to be "at risk" for further abuse. Here, we apply a family bonding perspective to address the practical side of risk assessment for those children already in foster care. We present a conceptual model that attaches numerical value to the various components of the parent–child bond and demonstrate how the model can be operationalized during supervised visitations. Using data from a family visitation center, we demonstrate the model's potential for interagency collaboration in the permanency placement decision‐making process.

Although focus groups continue to gain popularity in marketing and social science research, their use in program evaluation has been limited. Here we demonstrate how focus groups can benefit evaluators, program staff, policy makers and administrators by providing an in‐depth understanding of program effectiveness from the perspective of participants as stakeholders in program outcomes. Using data from the Youth Action Program, a prevention program funded by the United States Air Force for military dependent adolescents at risk, our methodology included a narrative approach to data analysis, combining theme analysis with a systematic interpretive approach centering on how group members experienced the program within the contexts of their daily lives. We show that the parents benefited from the program beyond youth outcomes, and this was useful information for program improvement and expansion.