The University is collaborating with seven universities to offer training and resources through a new national institute to improve child welfare.
The U.S. Children’s Bureau (Administration for Children and Families, Department of Health and Human Services) awarded a five-year, $16.5 million grant to fund the National Child Welfare Workforce Institute.
The funding comes as many states attempt to improve a system that has struggled to supply enough well-trained social workers to handle cases. In Michigan the lack of foster care workers, their unmet need for specialized training, and the failure of workers to follow agency policy, have contributed to several child deaths and injuries in recent years, says U-M researcher Kathleen Coulborn Faller.
Faller and Robert Ortega, both professors at the School of Social Work, will work on the project with colleagues at The University at Albany (N.Y.) School of Social Welfare and its partners. National partners include the National Indian Child Welfare Association, the Child Welfare League of America, the University of North Carolina, University of Denver, University of Southern Maine, University of Iowa, Michigan State University and Fordham University.
U-M will receive $300,000 for two major efforts. Researchers will develop a national curriculum for child welfare supervisors and mid-managers on cultural competency, which Faller and Ortega have previously taught in Michigan, Maine, California and Washington, D.C. This program, which also is called cultural humility, allows social workers who often are white and female to work more effectively with families of different races and ethnicities, Faller says.
“It’s a way of approaching people different from yourself, honoring their culture and understanding how they see the world,” Faller says, adding that Ortega will take the lead in this online training project.
U-M’s funding also will involve other Web seminars on training programs, Faller says. The University will consult with MSU on evaluating child welfare training efforts nationwide. MSU will allocate about nine grants.
