Evidence Based Practices
Current Highlights
- Partnering for Success: Web-Based Training for Child Welfare & Juvenile Justice
- Care Coordinator Partnership with EBP Providers, Youth & their Families: Infographic to Guide Partnerships
The model was developed by the University of Maryland School of Social Work (UMSSW) and its partners, through funding provided by the Administration for Children, Youth and Families, Children’s Bureau. This partnership allowed the SSW to establish the National Center for Evidence-Based Practice in Child Welfare, now within The Institute’s Evidence-Based Practice Center. Learn more: Children’s Bureau Express: Partnering to Improve Mental Health Outcomes in Child Welfare.
PFS provides a framework for cross-system collaboration that addresses the crucial need for skilled partnership between the systems responsible for the coordination of care (e.g. child welfare and juvenile justice) and the providers of evidence-based programs and practices (EBPs). The increasing availability of trauma-informed EBPs across states and in communities makes the need for this effective partnership even greater so that EBPs realize their potential benefit to children, youth, and families.
PFS builds core competencies of child welfare and juvenile justice professionals using a multifaceted, ecological approach that focuses on three levels: (1) the system level; (2) the staff and leadership level; and (3) the child and youth level. This results in a shared knowledge base, as well as common protocols, practices, and tools to assess needs, support treatment and monitor progress.
PFS builds the capacity of these child-serving systems through training, coaching, and organizational support. It applies adult learning principles and facilitates peer-to-peer learning and supports system leaders to apply successful strategies for installing and sustaining evidence-based programs from implementation science research (Aaron, Hurlburt, & Horwitz, 2011; Beidas et al., 2015; Palinkas et al., 2014).
Training and Transfer of Learning Tailored to:
- Care Coordinators to Partner with Evidence-Based Service Providers to Improve Child and Youth Well-being
- Mental Health Providers to Support Youth Mental Health Needs
- Treatment Foster Care Coordinators to Support Youth Mental Health Needs
- System leaders
Training and transfer of learning is delivered synchronously, either virtual or in-person. The training for Care Coordinators can additionally be delivered in a virtual, asynchronous format.
Technical Assistance
Our team brings extensive knowledge of practice and administration. We deliver effective, flexible, and integrated consultation and other types of technical assistance that are responsive to the individual and organization’s needs.
Research
Featured articles on evaluation and research findings:
- Child and Youth Services Review: Partnering for Success: Implementing a Cross-Systems Collaborative Model Between Behavioral Health and Child Welfare
- Journal of Clinical Pediatrics: Partnering for Success- A Prototype for Integrating Evidence-based Practices Between Referring Professionals and Mental Health Professionals
- Administration and Policy in Mental Health and Mental Health Services Research: Partnering for Success: Factors Impacting Implementation of a Cross‑Systems
Child Welfare Partnerships
New York City Administration for Children’s Services (ACS) ▾
In 2014, New York City Administration for Children’s Services (ACS) implemented several improvement initiatives and programs under its Title IV-E Child Welfare Waiver Demonstration Project, Strong Families NYC, which included PfS. The University of Maryland, School of Social Work collaborated with ACS’s Workforce Institute, a partnership with the School of Professional Studies at the City University of New York (CUNY), to adapt PfS to New York City’s unique child welfare context and develop local trainer capacity. This has allowed Workforce Institute trainers to deliver PfS to all ACS’s contracted regular family foster care agencies.
ACS now operates one the largest and most diverse array of evidence-based and evidence-informed preventive programs of any municipal child welfare jurisdiction. Its suite of EBPs encompasses 16 service models with the capacity to serve more than 8,000 child welfare-involved families each year. ACS reported that PfS support for collaborative and evidence-based therapeutic services was a natural fit for ACS, and advanced their efforts to effectively implement evidence-based programs.
Contacts:
Chris Rector, MSW
Deputy Director, Evidence-Based Models
CUNY School of Professional Studies, Administration for Children’s Services Workforce Institute
Ina Mendez
Assistant Commissioner, Office of Title IV-E Waiver Implementation & Support
Administration for Children’s Services, New York, New York
Maryland Department of Human Services/ Social Services Administration (MD DHS/ SSA) and Baltimore County Department of Social Services (DSS) began implementing PFS under its Title IV-E Child Welfare Waiver Demonstration Project, Families Blossom, in 2015. The partnership has sustained since the completion of the Title IV-E Waiver. The PFS Implementation Team has met consistently since this time with ongoing support from The University of Maryland, School of Social Work. The SSW has trained over 500 DSS and mental health practitioners.
Baltimore County PFS has built effective working relationships between child welfare and mental health professionals and expanded access to evidence-based mental health treatment. Child welfare professionals have gained a greater understanding of the impact of trauma, the use of standardized assessments to identify trauma and other common treatment targets, and how to effectively refer children for appropriate services and monitor treatment. The training and transfer of learning activities for DSS and treatment foster care agencies built skills to partner not only with CBT+ providers, but all the evidence-based and promising program providers in Baltimore County. Training and transfer of learning have been provided to mental health agencies to deliver Cognitive Behavioral Therapy+ (CBT+), which addresses needs most commonly presented by children in the child welfare system- behavior, anxiety, trauma, and depression.
Contacts:
Mark Millspaugh, MA
Director for Children's Services
Baltimore County Department of Social Services
Susan Loysen, LCSW-C
Foster Care Administrator
Baltimore County Department of Social Services
Oklahoma Department of Human Services (DHS) ▾
In 2015, Oklahoma implemented PfS and reported that it viewed PfS as a logical extension of a prior federally funded initiative to rollout universal behavioral health screening, train the child welfare workforce in data-informed case management, and evidence-based children’s mental health practices. PfS child welfare staff were trained on the impact of trauma, the use of standardized assessments to identify trauma and other common treatment targets, and how to effectively refer children for appropriate services and monitor treatment. Training and transfer of learning were provided to mental health agencies to deliver Cognitive Behavioral Therapy+ (CBT+), which addresses issues most commonly presented by children in the child welfare system- behavior, anxiety, trauma, and depression.
Contacts:
Keitha Wilson, MSW
Prevention Program Administrator
Oklahoma Department of Human Services Child Welfare Services
Guy Willis, LCSW
Program Administrator, Child Welfare Training Center
Oklahoma Department of Human Services Child Welfare Services
For more information contact:
Jessie Watrous, Evidence-Based Programs Director, jessie.watrous@ssw.umaryland.edu