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  • Family Group Decision-Making

Family Group Decision-Making

Family group decision-making is a generic term that includes a number of approaches in which family members are brought together to make decisions about how to care for their children and develop a plan for services. Different names used for this type of intervention include family team conferencing, family team meetings, family group conferencing, family team decision-making, family unity meetings, and team decision-making. Approaches differ in various aspects, but most consist of several phases and employ a trained facilitator or coordinator.

  • State and local examples

Adapting Family Group Decision Making for Native Communities [Presentation]
Fong, Faulkner, LaBrenz, & Cournoyer (2018)
Society for Social Work and Research 
Describes a federally funded project to promote permanency and prevent discontinuity in adoption and guardianship within Native American communities. The project uses an adaptation of family group decision-making to encourage permanency conversations among families. 

Episode 16: Family Group Decision-Making: Implementing the Family Group Conference [Podcast]
Child Welfare Information Gateway (2017)
Presents information on family group decision-making, including a podcast that gives listeners an overview of how the Family Group Conference model is implemented in one State.

Family Engagement: Partnering With Families to Improve Child Welfare Outcomes

Series Title
Bulletins for Professionals
Author(s)
Child Welfare Information Gateway
Availability
View
Download (PDF - 437KB)
Year Published
2021
Provides an overview of the foundational elements of the family engagement approach, followed by strategies and promising practices for implementing this approach.

Partnering With Birth Parents To Promote Reunification

Series Title
Factsheets for Families
Author(s)
Child Welfare Information Gateway
Availability
View
Download (PDF - 347KB)
Disponibilidad
Ver
Versión para imprimir (PDF - 360KB)
Ordene (Gratis)
Year Published
2019
Explores how foster caregivers can partner with the birth families of the children in their care to promote reunification. The factsheet seeks to dispel common myths that both sides might hold about the other by drawing from foster and birth parent interviews and taking a lessons-learned approach.

What Social Workers Should Know About Family Group Decision-Making
Walden University (2018)
Explains family group decision-making (FDGM) as a collection of approaches that can be used to help families make decisions about the future care of their children. The website provides an overview of FDGM and its basic values, benefits for families, and more. 

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Spotlight On

Episode 16: Family Group Decision-Making: Implementing the Family Group Conference [Podcast]

Child Welfare Information Gateway (2017)

Episode 17: Family Group Decision-Making: Parent Advocates in New York City [Podcast]

Child Welfare Information Gateway (2017)

Lessons From the Field: Successful Strategies for Implementing Family Group Decision Making (FGDM)

Child Welfare Information Gateway (2017)

Professional Development in FGDM

Kempe Center for the Prevention and Treatment of Child Abuse and Neglect

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Engaging families in group decision-making

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