A Brief History of Child Protective Services in the United States
The historical underpinnings of child protective services in the United States can be dated to 1874. In 1866 the New York Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals was founded by Henry Bergh with a view toward more humane treatment of animals in New York City. The society’s main focus was on draught horses and other work animals that were so common on the streets of New York in the late nineteenth century.
Just 8 years later, in 1874, a young girl named Mary Ellen Wilson was found to be living in deplorable conditions and suffering terrible abuse at the hands of her alleged stepmother, Francis Connolly. This situation came to the attention of a Methodist missionary named Etta Angell Wheeler who tried in vain to get existing authorities to intervene in the matter. Finally, in desperation, Mrs. Wheeler turned to Henry Bergh. Mr. Bergh brought the case before the New York Supreme Court and successfully argued that the child was in imminent danger and should be removed from the home. Judge Abraham Lawrence agreed and that same day Mary Ellen was removed from home and brought before the court. After Mary Ellen’s chilling testimony about the abuse and neglect she had suffered at the hands of Francis Connolly, she was permanently removed from the home and was placed with the Woman’s Aid Society and Home for Friendless Girls. At that time, all juveniles were handled by the New York Department of Charities and Correction, and regardless of whether a girl was homeless, orphaned, or delinquent, they were all treated the same. Consequently, Mary Ellen was placed in a home with mostly delinquent adolescents.
Again, Etta Wheeler intervened with Judge Lawrence. Henry Bergh was consulted and finally it was decided to turn the child over to Etta Wheeler. Wheeler, not wanting to raise the child in the slums of New York City where she carried out her missionary work, brought Mary Ellen to her mother’s house outside the city. Soon after, Wheeler’s mother became ill and Mary Ellen was raised by Etta Wheeler’s sister, where she thrived. She grew up to be a happy, healthy adult and lived to the age of 92.
At the time of the initial hearing and removal of Mary Ellen from her home, it was widely reported that Henry Bergh argued that the child was, first and foremost, an animal, and therefore entitled to the protection of the New York Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals. In truth, this was not the argument that Bergh made. He actually made a more compelling argument. He cited Section 65 of the Habeas Corpus Act, which states, “Whenever it shall appear by satisfactory proof that anyone is held in illegal confinement or custody, and that there is good reason to believe that he will … suffer some irreparable injury, before he can be relieved by the issuing of a habeas corpus or ceriorari , any court or officer authorized to issue such writs, may issue a warrant … and bring him before such court or officer, to be dealt with according to law.”
This argument had much wider application and was subsequently used to rescue many more children from abusive and neglectful homes. A newspaper reporter who was present at the hearing when Mary Ellen was brought in to testify later wrote, “I knew that I was where the first chapter of children’s rights was being written.”
That same year, Henry Bergh founded the New York Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Children (NYSPCC). In 1877, it was merged with the New York Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals and several other animal right groups to form the American Humane Association, which is still active in efforts to protect both children and animals.
From that time on there was a growing awareness of the desperate conditions of millions of children in the United States. Cities, states, and the Federal Government began to awaken to these conditions, but actual services for these children were generally left to churches and charities. This did not change significantly until the Roosevelt era, when government began to take a greater role in social services. In 1935 Congress passed the landmark Social Security Act. This was the first time that Federal funds were specifically allocated to child welfare services. Congress continued to fund child welfare services through the Social Security Act, using a series of amendments aimed at expanding funding for child welfare. This included funding for foster care for children who could not safely remain with their parents.
In 1958 Congress again amended Title V to require states to provide matching funds in order to remain eligible for Federal funds. In 1967 Title V became Title IV B of the Social Security Act titled, “Child Welfare Services.” In 1961 Congress expanded Title V-A, “Aid to Families with Dependent Children” (AFDC), which included funding for foster care for children. In 1969 it became mandatory for all states to participate in this program and by 1973, more than 100,000 children were in foster care placements funded by Title IV-A.
Modern Child Welfare
A landmark advance in child protection came in 1961 when Dr. C. Henry Kempe convened his now famous conference on child abuse titled, “The Battered Child Syndrome.” The conference called national and international attention to the reality that many “accidental” childhood injuries were in fact the result of “battering” (abuse). The conference and the ensuing article of the same title generated a demand that the issue of child abuse and neglect be dealt with more openly.
The next step in the evolution of child protection came in 1974 with the creation by the Federal Government of the “Child Abuse and Neglect Prevention and Treatment Act” (CAPTA), which in turn created the National Center on Child Abuse and Neglect. The work of CAPTA and the National Center was bolstered in 1980 with the passage of further Federal child protection legislation titled, “The Foster Care and Adoption Assistance Act of 1980.” This act required, among many other things, that children not languish in foster care and that every child must have a permanent home—whether his or her own home or an adoptive home.
In 1994, Congress, feeling that children were still languishing in foster care and were not sufficiently protected, passed “The Adoption and Safe Families Act.” This act demanded that all states ensure the safety, permanence, and well-being of every child in the child welfare system. To ensure that the states are complying with the provisions of this act, Congress also ordered the Department of Health and Human Services, Office for Children, Administration of Children and Families (ACF) to review each state’s child welfare agency to measure their compliance with this mandate. If a state was found out of compliance with the Act, ACF was to order the state to put in place a “Program Improvement Plan” (PIP) to ensure future compliance with the critical elements of safety, permanence, and well-being. On March 25, 2000 a final rule was approved identifying specifically how the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) was going to conduct the review of each state’s child welfare agency. The Children’s Bureau, a division of HHS, would conduct a Child and Family Service Review (CFSR). The goal of the CFSR was to help states improve their child welfare program, the quality of which would be determined by the outcomes on the following measures :
Safety: (1) Children are first and foremost protected from abuse and neglect. (2) Children are safely maintained in their homes whenever possible.
Permanency: (1) Children have permanency and stability in their living situation. (2) The continuity of family relationships and connections is preserved.
Well-being: (1) Families have enhanced capacity to provide for their children’s needs. (2) Children receive appropriate services to meet their educational needs. (3) Children receive adequate services to meet their physical and mental health needs.
In addition, there were seven systemic factors that had to be reviewed and judged to be either in “substantial conformity” or “area needing improvement.” Armed with these criteria, the Children’s Bureau began their on-site reviews in the spring of 2002. Since that time all 50 states and the District of Columbia and Puerto Rico have been reviewed and not a single entity has been found to be in full compliance with all seven measures. As a consequence, each state, Puerto Rico, and the District of Columbia were ordered to develop a PIP to address the areas in which they were found in need of improvement.
In the spring of 2007, a second round of reviews began. To date, no state has been found in compliance with all measures during the second round of reviews, leading to a second round of PIP that will be required.
Through these reviews the Children’s Bureau has identified a number of promising practices in child welfare but has not developed a model child protection program or identified the necessary elements of an effective child protection system.
Effective Child Welfare Organizations
In order to be an effectively functioning twenty-first–century organization, child welfare must definitively address some of the age-old problems that have frustrated both front-line staff and administrators since its inception. It must also embrace some emerging practices that show promise for more effective child welfare organizations. The problems that must be confronted and addressed are numerous, but particular emphasis must be placed on leadership, staff turnover, burnout, secondary trauma, caseloads, and compensation.
Leadership
Leadership in child welfare must begin with the state’s Governor. The Governor must be committed to the goals and mission of child welfare/child protective services (CPS) and must act accordingly. He or she must ensure adequate funding for CPS and must work with the state legislature to make children a priority of state government. Many organizations and advocates are prepared to help in this effort, but it must be led by the Governor. It is not lost on politicians that children do not vote and many of the parents of children involved with the child welfare system do not vote either. It is also imperative that the Governor choose a head of child welfare/CPS who is committed to the goals and mission of child welfare and is thoroughly qualified for the position by means of extensive experience in the field and real leadership capabilities. All too often, Child Welfare Directors or Commissioners are chosen, not for their outstanding qualifications, but for political considerations. Although no unit of government benefits from underqualified leaders, this is especially true in child welfare services where the safety and well-being of children depend upon competent leadership. The fact that the welfare of children supersedes political considerations must be understood and appreciated by all elected leaders.
Another leadership issue that must be addressed is the “culture of blame” in CPS. All too frequently when a tragic event occurs in an active child welfare case, the immediate reaction of much of the media, political leaders, and the community is to find someone to blame. This culture of blame often results in the dismissal of the child welfare director, the front-line worker, the supervisor, and other staff who were involved in the decisions in the case. The net effect of this is that child protective staff often makes decisions in an atmosphere of fear. Fear, not best practice, then drives the handling of cases. Although it is absolutely correct to hold people accountable for malfeasance and/or dereliction of duty, it is not right to destroy a worker’s career for a decision made with the best information available, however poor the outcome may be. Human nature is highly unpredictable and sometimes people do terrible things that could not be reasonably anticipated. After the death of a child in the custody of child welfare services, it is usual for a panel of experts to be empanelled to review the circumstances of the case. This panel, with an abundance of time to review the case and to contemplate if the correct decision or decisions were made, then completes its report with the full benefit of hindsight. It must be understood that this process in no way resembles the realities of child welfare practice in which critical decisions must be made with limited time and limited information. This is where leaders distinguish themselves. They either “pile on” or they support their staff, if a justifiable and reasonable decision was made, even if the outcome was tragic.
Staff Turnover
Public child welfare social work is among the most difficult forms of social work practice. Unlike most other social work practice, child welfare is often confrontational, adversarial, and authoritarian. Yet child welfare social workers, like other social workers, came to the profession to help ease the burden of others. As a consequence, the turnover rate among child welfare workers is among the highest in the field and far exceeds other professions. Turnover in child welfare has been estimated at 30% to 40% annually. This means that an entire child welfare staff can turn over in less than 3 years, and almost every state and county reports difficulty in recruiting competent replacement staff. There are many causes for turnover in child welfare, including high caseloads and workloads, low salaries, risk to personal safety, insufficient training, administrative burdens, secondary trauma, and “burnout.”
Adding additional pressure to child welfare workers and administrators is the finding of the U.S. General Accounting Office (GAO) that in one jurisdiction, 90% of child protective staff had experienced verbal threats, 30% had been physically attacked, and 13% had been threatened with weapons. The GAO also found that child welfare salaries are significantly below salaries for employees in safer and more supportive environments such as teachers, school social workers, nurses, and public health social workers. Likewise, recruitment of qualified candidates is a constant challenge and is considered one of the major problems facing child welfare administrators. This results in the inability of child welfare agencies to ensure the safety, permanency, and well-being of children in their care and the inability to comply with the requirements of the Child and Family Service Reviews.
Burnout
Burnout is defined as, “A breakdown of the psychological defenses that a worker uses to cope with intense job related stress.” It is a syndrome in which workers feel emotionally exhausted or fatigued, withdraw emotionally from their clients, and perceive a diminution of their achievement or accomplishments. Burnout results from some or all of the aforementioned reasons for turnover among child welfare social workers. In many instances burnout results in turnover, as workers leave the field for less stressful, less emotionally draining careers. In those instances in which burnout does not result in the worker leaving the agency, it results in workers providing suboptimal care to the children and families they serve, which further harms the worker and the agency. In either event, burnout takes a huge toll on the worker, the agency, and its clients.
Burnout is also related to “compassion fatigue,” another phenomenon noted among child welfare personnel. Compassion fatigue results in the worker no longer being able to feel empathy for the child or family to whom they are providing services.
Secondary Trauma
Secondary trauma is defined as, “The natural consequent behaviors and emotions resulting from the knowledge about a traumatizing event experienced by a significant other—the stress resulting from helping or wanting to help a traumatized or suffering person.” In child welfare work, it is the product of regularly witnessing human beings at their worst. There are few other professions that witness human cruelty and depravity more regularly, or more personally, than child welfare workers. Secondary trauma can be triggered by any number of experiences that child welfare workers face on a daily basis. These include sexual abuse of infants and children, extreme abuse of a child, use of children in pornography, removal of children from their homes, termination of parental rights, or the death of a child, especially one for whom the worker had responsibility. Although secondary trauma and burnout have many similarities, they are not the same thing. Secondary trauma is more personal, intense, and debilitating.
Caseloads
There is near unanimous agreement that child welfare caseloads are too high in nearly every state and county. This is made abundantly clear in the GAO report on child welfare agencies that links high caseloads to the inability to meet Federal standards on safety, permanency, and well-being. In addition to the GAO, the Child Welfare League of America has established standards calling for caseloads of between 12 and 15 families per worker, while at the same time acknowledging that caseloads are frequently “… two, three and even four times that number.”
Compensation
Salaries in child welfare cover a very broad range. According to the Child Welfare League of America’s 2005 Salary Study, the starting salary for a child protective service worker with a college degree working for a public agency ranged from a low of $24,410 to a high of $42,468. Another detailed review of child welfare agencies was conducted by the National Council on Crime and Delinquency (NCCD). The NCCD reviewed the overall functioning of selected child welfare agencies and grouped them into one of three clusters: high functioning, moderately functioning, and low functioning. High-functioning organizations were identified as having the lowest turnover rates, the best compliance with recognized practice standards, the highest compensation, and the lowest rate of re-abuse of children. The lowest functioning organizations had the highest turnover rates, the least compliance with recognized practice standards, the lowest compensation, and the highest rates of re-abuse of children. In the highest rated clusters, minimum salaries for child welfare workers were $56,571 and $70,057 for child welfare supervisors. In the lowest functioning clusters, minimum salaries were $32,245 for child welfare workers and $38,576 for supervisors.
Ultimately child welfare leaders must address an additional reality that plays an important role in staff turnover. In most jurisdictions, because of civil service rules, union contracts, or other structures where seniority is a critical consideration, the net result is that the least-experienced, least-trained staff are charged with the greatest responsibility: the protection of children. Because child protection and child welfare are such difficult jobs, many workers transfer out to less stressful positions, leaving the least-trained and least-experienced staff on the front lines. Child welfare leaders must implement processes and procedures that limit this practice. Accepting this “reality” puts children at risk and is a real disservice to young staff. They must also recognize that front-line child welfare workers need more time off than is typically given to a new worker. Child welfare workers must be viewed differently than other civil servants and deserve more time for rest and recover from their extraordinarily stressful jobs. They must also be allowed to rotate off the front lines for periods of time without having to give up their positions in child welfare or losing seniority.
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