CASAMN needs items (donations) for CASA Cares May 31st Fundraiser
CASA Cares provides grants to children in foster care
We care about state ward children and want them to have the things that other children have.
Help us make that happen.
DetailsMari Frankel’s video documentary “Foster” below is stunning. Although it is about Florida’s foster system (by a CASA GAL just like me) it demonstrates the problems within the child protection system and the traumas & medications foster children live.with.
Mari Frankel’s video is aligned with KARA’s book and documentary projects that address child protection stories that are happening in MN.
Share this with people you know and/or,
Contact me to talk about ideas for making this video in MN (we have begun the process and have been partnered with TPT) but need help to complete the project.
Let’s be a voice for children
All Adults Are The Protectors of All Children
https://vimeo.com/139417634
The password is foster
Details“What we do to our children, they will do to our society” Pliny the Elder 2500 years ago.
DetailsPressed by the demands of the “global war on terrorism”, theUnited States is violating an international protocol that forbids the recruitment of children under the age of 18 for military service, according to a new report released Tuesday by a major civil rights group that charged that recruitment practices target children as young as 11 years old.
The 46-page report, “Soldiers of Misfortune”, was prepared by theAmerican Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) for submission to the U.N. Committeeon the Rights of the Child.
DetailsAZ: Money for foster care in Arizona could be cut by more than half
ABC15.com April 18, 2012
The Chandler couple doesn’t understand why state lawmakers would even consider a 60 percent cut to Child Protective Services.
Under one of the two proposed budgets, $49 million used for monthly expenses would be slashed.
The Bartos said their monthly allowance was already cut by 20 percent a year and half ago.
http://www.abc15.com/dpp/news/region_southeast_valley/chandler/money-for-foster-care-in-arizona-could-be-cut-by-more-than-half
AZ: Arizona CPS seeing increase in child-abuse reports
Associated Press April 18, 2012
A record-high number of child abuse reports in Arizona has led the state’s child welfare agency to turn to a special investigative team to help with case management, officials said Wednesday.
http://www.azcentral.com/news/articles/2012/04/18/20120418arizona-cps-seeing-increase-child-abuse-reports.html
Detailshe data from almost all quality of life indices shows clearly that children in northern European nations are healthier, live longer, and are happier than American youth. This article shines a look into a mundane but meaningful difference in the way the U.S. deals with childbirth.
DetailsThe Metric that Matters
I have a friend who thinks government can always cut more staff. I told him when child protection investigators get more than 4-5 new cases a week they become ineffective.
He grudgingly conceded “I guess there have to be some metrics”.
Minnesota tried to keep this caseload ‘metric’ manageable last year by only responding to 28% of maltreatment reports, compared to 62% nationally. This means 21,960 children didn’t get a needed visit from a child protection worker.
Sorry, but fixing this will require adding staff, because decisions to investigate families and potentially even remove children can’t really be privatized.
We have to put aside reservations about ‘big’ government and help counties excel at this work so we can achieve the metric that matters: as many safe children as possible.
DetailsSeven children died last year from abuse or neglect despite prior knowledge by Minnesota child protection agencies that their lives were at risk, records provided to the Star Tribune show.
That total is the highest in the state’s records, which go back to 2005. The Department of Human Services said it will study each case to probe whether county social workers missed chances to save the child, but an initial review has found that some counties could have done more.
DetailsI was raised by a single mom who made a fraction of the salary that men in her office earned. It was harder in other ways for her also as overt sexism was not just tolerated, it was the rule.
It hurts me to see that today my home town is the second poorest in the nation in this study;
http://www.businessinsider.com/gender-pay-gap-in-us-cities-2016-6
DetailsThe division has been under a consent decree since 2005. The agreement stems from a 2002 class action lawsuit in which Children’s Rights claimed that Georgia’s child protection agencies were overburdened and mismanaged. The group alleged that children languished for months in dangerous shelters, and others lived in dirty and overcrowded conditions.
Details
