All parts of the child welfare continuum—child and family serving organizations, social workers, parents, kinship caregivers, adoptive or foster parents, and children themselves—have been fundamentally impacted by the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic. Several CWLA Press titles speak to managing stress and crisis situations; empowering children, youth, and those in the child welfare field; and maintaining safety
On Tuesday, April 21, a fourth COVID-19 relief package was agreed to and began to move through Congress for final approval on Thursday. Some are referring to it as coronavirus bill 3.1 or 3.5 because it refills some of the funding initiatives created in the first three bills. The bill does not add additional state
Young people in and aging out of foster care have been hit hard by COVID-19. Without family to turn to, young people should have access to support and services so they can make it through this crisis healthy and ready to thrive. Congress should provide this assistance to young people by increasing Chafee funds by
On Wednesday, April 22, CWLA hosted the webinar, Pandemic Shines Light on Needs of Older Youth Involved with Child Welfare. Victoria Kelly, CWLA board member, and Professor Cassandra Simmel from Rutgers’s School of Social Work moderated the panel. Panelists included Professor Laura Abrams from UCLA, Grace Hillard-Koshinsky from New England Association of Child Welfare Commissioner
All parts of the child welfare continuum—child and family serving organizations, social workers, parents, kinship caregivers, adoptive or foster parents, and children themselves—have been fundamentally impacted by the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic. Several CWLA Press titles speak to managing stress and crisis situations; empowering children, youth, and those in the child welfare field; and maintaining safety
While CWLA applauds Congress for the efforts made to contain the spread and impact of the pandemic, more aid is needed to protect children and families most at risk during this time and address the emerging needs of states and localities. Over the last month, CWLA has emphasized the real experiences that child welfare agencies
Congressman Danny Davis (D-IL) updated the guide for kinship caregivers on COVID-19 stimulus payments last week with several updates from the IRS with important updates including: • “Certain kinship caregivers may need to quickly give the IRS information about their children in order to get stimulus payments for children in 2020; once payments are sent,
The New York Times piece discusses how poverty is likely to rise disproportionately for children due to the COVID-19 outbreak and the resulting economic downturn. This pandemic threatens families with children who will be hit the greatest as their expenses increase, but their income does not. With child poverty in the US already at 13
Sixto Cancel, Founder and CEO of Think of Us, hosted a webinar with the Associate Commissioner of the Children's Bureau, Dr. Jerry Milner, Chris Patterson from the Department of Housing and Development, and Ruth White from the National Center for Housing and Child Welfare (NCHCW). Sixto and Patterson both were former foster youth who aged
A new report and paper through the Bookings Institute, The opioid crisis and community-level spillovers onto children’s education, outlines how the impact of opioids has altered education outcomes for children in communities hit by the drug crisis. The authors set out to determine, “What is the effect on children’s learning while being embedded in a