This podcast series, produced on behalf of the Children's Bureau, presents a series of interviews and group conversations intended to provide beneficial information for busy child welfare and social work professionals. The podcasts cover a wide range of topics and provide perspectives from communities served by child welfare agencies along with tips and stories from professionals about implementing new services and programs, working across agencies, and improving practice.
The podcasts are available on Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, and SoundCloud. Subscribe to receive new episodes as they are released.
The views and opinions expressed within these podcasts do not necessarily reflect those of the Children's Bureau or the Administration for Children and Families.
Episode 64: Reunification
Focuses on the current reality of reunification across our public child welfare system. Listeners will hear a conversation among child welfare professionals, members of the American Bar Association (ABA) Center on Children and the Law, the Children's Bureau, and an alumnus of foster care
Episode 63: Foster Care Alumni - Making Lived Experience Matter, Part 1
Shares perspectives, personal stories, and guidance from members and former members of Foster Care Alumni of America to help agencies understand the value of alumni of all ages, provide information on how to look for and find the right alumni partners, and discuss the impact sharing has on alumni, especially alumni who work as child welfare professionals.
Episode 62: Thriving Families, Safer Children - A National Commitment to Well-Being, Part 2
Focuses on implementing the Thriving Families, Safer Children effort, including guidance for how agency leaders can review their policies and tactics to evolve toward a more just and equitable child welfare system. This episode is the second in a two-part series featuring conversations with leaders of the national organizations partnering with the Children’s Bureau.
Episode 61: Thriving Families, Safer Children - A National Commitment to Well-Being, Part 1
Dives into a deeper discussion of the Thriving Families, Safer Children effort; discusses the characteristics that lead to successful partnerships; and emphasizes the important role family voice has in shaping change. This episode is the first in a two-part series featuring conversations with leaders of the national organizations partnering with the Children’s Bureau.
Episode 60: What Did Child Welfare Learn From 2020 - Child Welfare as Public Health
Discusses the impact child welfare can have within a jurisdiction's overarching public health approach. This podcast episode is part three of a three-part series that examines what the child welfare field learned during 2020.
Episode 59: What Did Child Welfare Learn from 2020 - upEnding Systemic Racism
Features members of the Center for the Study of Social Policy who are working with the University of Houston Graduate College of Social Work to lead the upEND movement. This podcast episode is part two of a three-part series that examines what the child welfare field learned during 2020.
Episode 58: What Did Child Welfare Learn from 2020 - Caseworker Care
Identifies potential changes or shifts in how the child welfare field operates during a pandemic. Listeners will hear from Andrew Winters, a member of the Quality Improvement Center for Workforce Development (QIC-WD). This podcast episode is part one of a three-part series that examines what the child welfare field learned during the coronavirus pandemic in 2020.
Episode 57: Connecting Cross-Border Families
Provides insight on the diverse types of cross-border cases and the supports and information that may help State and local caseworkers connect cross-border families.
Episode 56: Prevention Training for Home Visitors
Features the Institute for the Advancement of Family Support Professionals, a collaboration between State agencies, universities, and home visiting organizations that offers 66 e-learning modules supporting the National Family Support Competency Framework. The framework is a shared model of competencies and skills common across home visiting and child welfare professionals.
Episode 55: National Adoption Month - Engage Youth, Listen and Learn
Shares two examples of jurisdictions increasing youth involvement with their own permanency plans. This podcast is in alignment with National Adoption Month 2020.
Episode 54: Supporting Parenting and Expectant Teens in Foster Care
Features a conversation to help States and agencies leverage the provisions of Family First Prevention Services Act to support parenting and expectant teens in foster care.
Episode 53: Creating a Family First Prevention Plan - Utah
Provides the historical background, strategies, and decision-making Utah applied in developing their prevention plan. The information shared may be helpful for jurisdictions developing prevention plans to implement FFPSA, which expands prevention services to help stabilize and strengthen families.
Episode 52: Creating a Family First Prevention Plan - Washington, D.C.
Offers information for jurisdictions developing prevention plans to implement the Federal Family First Prevention Services Act, which expands prevention services to help stabilize and strengthen families.
Episode 51: Family First – Title IV-E Prevention Plan Implementation Updates, Part 2
Shares the second half of the Children's Bureau webinar, Title IV-E Prevention Plan Implementation Updates, including tips to aid prevention plan developers as they shape their plans to align with Family First. Child welfare leaders from Washington, DC and Utah also answer questions submitted during the webinar by participants.
Episode 50: Family First - Title IV-E Prevention Plan Implementation Updates, Part 1
Discusses the Children's Bureau webinar, Title IV-E Prevention Plan Implementation Updates, intended to provide child welfare leaders and their partners with perspectives, tips, and guidance on developing and implementing prevention plans to support their unique needs while taking advantage of the provisions within the Family First Prevention Services Act.
Episode 49: A Guide to Implementing Family First
Features a conversation about a guide developed by a coalition of organization to help agencies implement the Family First Prevention Services Act.
Episode 48: Changing the Face of Foster Care
Focuses on increasing awareness of the needs of children, youth, and families involved in foster care, along with the value of ensuring foster care is used as a support for families instead of a substitute for parents.
Episode 47: Prevention - Evaluating Statewide Prevention
Shares how California compares diverse prevention programs and resources applied across all its counties to evaluate prevention efforts from a statewide perspective.
Episode 46: Prevention - Evaluating Prevention Programs
Details how one prevention program in Kentucky applies a diverse set of tools and assessments to review and monitor the program and how that information is compared across a network of 17 regional community partners.
Episode 45: Prevention - Collaborating Across an Entire State
Focuses on Community-Based Child Abuse Prevention (CBCAP) grantees. These grantees are in a unique position of leadership as they assume responsibility for directing, leading, and evaluating the network of public-private partnerships and the continuum of preventive services for children and families in their states.