Child Welfare

Celebrating A Year of Child Welfare Achievements

By Deana Fisher, LMSW, Director of Child Welfare Services, The Children’s Center, Detroit

 

One of our primary goals at The Children’s Center is to find new ways to enhance the care we provide to children. In the last year alone, we’ve taken some major steps to expand our services, extend training, and improve the quality of the resources we provide for families.

Take a look at a few of our greatest achievements:

Training

  • 90% of our staff have completed trauma training, and are able to provide trauma care for our children.

Compliance

  • 100% compliance with the health care rules and regulations as mandated by the State of Michigan.

Foster Care

  • 50% reduction in the number of 30-day replacement requests submitted by foster parents.
  • 30% increase in the number of foster children receiving therapy.
  • Foster parent recruitment staff fielded over 400 inquiries and conducted over 200 orientations, which led to 140 people in PRIDE training. PRIDE stands for Parent Resources for Information, Development, and Education. It’s a program used to prepare and educate families that are interested in providing foster care or in becoming adoptive homes for children in the foster care system.

Adoption

  • We recently expanded adoption and foster care services to Monroe, Washtenaw, and Genesee counties.
  • 100% of adoption workers met or exceeded new performance guidelines.

Young Adult Self Sufficiency (YASS)

  • 85% of YASS kids over the age of 18 chose to remain in foster care and continue to receive services with YVAC (Young Adult Voluntary Foster Care).
  • 95% of YASS participants graduated from high school.
  • 85% of YASS graduates pursued higher education, 10% entered the work force.

Licensing

  • Licensing and foster care staff held the first ever “Foster Parents Night Out,” providing childcare services so foster parents could have a night out.
  • Replaced numerous unsafe beds and cribs for foster children to meet “safe sleep” guidelines.

It’s been a successful year here at The Children’s Center, marked by many amazing achievements. We’re looking forward to continuing our commitment to excellence in the years to come.