Child welfare professionals routinely meet with children and families in their communities. Sometimes environmental factors, such as a public health crisis, or situational factors, such as caseload and travel demands, prevent child welfare professionals from safely performing their duties in person. This webpage offers resources to support child welfare agencies and professionals build capacity to work remotely when in-person supervision and visitation practices are inappropriate or impractical.
Improving Human Services Using Virtual Technical Assistance
U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, Office of the Assistant Secretary for Planning and Evaluation (2020)
Presents promising strategies and lessons learned gathered from a literature review and interviews on the use of virtual technical assistance in a human services setting.
Successful Video Visits With Young Children
Burnson (2020)
National Council on Crime & Delinquency
Provides tips and strategies for overcoming potential challenges when hosting video visits with young children, including when there are technological limitations or language barriers or when participants may be in distress during a call.
Supervising Child Welfare Professionals Virtually During a Pandemic
Quality Improvement Center for Workforce Development (2020)
Offers tips and guidance for virtually supervising child welfare professionals, including ways to ensure employees’ emotional and communication needs are met.
| Series Title | Bulletins for Professionals |
| Author(s) | Child Welfare Information Gateway, Child Welfare Capacity Building Center for States |
| Availability | View Download (PDF - 370KB) |
| Year Published | 2020 |
Supporting the Child Welfare Workforce When People Have to Work From Home
Quality Improvement Center for Workforce Development (2020)
Presents low or no-cost technology options for child welfare agencies to manage a virtual or remote child welfare workforce.
| Series Title | Bulletins for Professionals |
| Author(s) | Child Welfare Information Gateway |
| Availability | View Download (PDF - 393KB) |
| Year Published | 2020 |
Using Media Effectively With Young Children and Virtual Visitation [Webinar]
Florida's Center for Child Welfare (2020)
Presents a two-part webinar series hosted by Dr. Rachal Barr on information, tips, and strategies for using remote and virtual communication to strengthen and maintain relationships between children and their families.
Virtual Case Management Considerations and Resources for Human Services Programs
Waters, Winston, & Ghertner (2020)
U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, Office of the Assistant Secretary for Planning and Evaluation
Explains three key considerations for performing case management online and over the telephone in place of in-person visits and services. This resource also provides related resources.
Virtual Communities of Practice in Child Welfare: A Review of the Literature
Richards & Melz (2020)
James Bell Associates
Summarizes research on virtual communities of practices (VCoP) that support peer learning and professional development. The literature review focuses on five components and strategies of successful VCoP: membership, participation, knowledge management and creation, learning, and practice.
Virtual Visitation Resources
Child Welfare Information Gateway (2020)
Lists resources on the use of virtual visitations in child welfare practice and other fields.
Virtual Workforce Supports
National Child Welfare Workforce Institute
Provides resources to support virtual child welfare practice, including a six-part webinar series, information on facilitating video conferencing, virtual supervision strategies, and more.