Separation, Placement, and Reunification in Child Welfare is the fourth module of the competency-based Core curriculum for new child welfare caseworkers. This module addresses the knowledge and skills required for child welfare caseworkers to provide services related to child placement, separation and placement services, family intervention, working with foster caregivers, reunification and stress management. The competencies taught in this curriculum module are comprised of knowledge and skills needed by all child welfare caseworkers.

New caseworkers and new supervisors.

Computer Based Training; Trails Child Welfare 2-Day Navigation or Trails Child Welfare 1-Day Navigation (more information on these trainings can be found at www.cocwtraining.com); New Caseworker Core I, New Caseworker Core II, New Caseworker Core III.

• Understand the necessity of permanency planning and reasonable efforts to prevent placement or promote timely reunification.
• Recognize that the separation and placement experience could lead to precipitation of psychological crisis for families and children and be able to apply concepts of crisis intervention theory to separation and placement of children.
• Understand the potentially traumatic outcomes of the separation and placement experience for children and their families, including serious disruption of family relationships and disturbances in the child’s cognitive, emotional, social, and physical development.
• Recognize the physical, emotional, and behavioral indicators of placement-induced stress in children of various ages and identify strategies for alleviating stress.
• Identify grieving reactions of parents resulting from the separation of their children and how this may affect behavior and interactions with the caseworker.
• Weigh the risk to a child of remaining at home against the potential trauma of separation when deciding whether to place a child into substitute care.
• Understand how properly structuring a placement can help prevent crisis and its consequences.
• Know how to design placement activities for the child, parent, and foster parent, including pre-placement preparation and visits, to minimize stress and provide emotional support to the child and family.
• Work collaboratively with caregivers to assess a child’s need for special developmental, medical, educational, social, psychological, and other services; to identify resources; and to obtain needed services.
• Identify the reasons for placement disruption and strategies to avoid it when children are in out-of-home care.
• Understand the necessity of regular and frequent visits to maintain the family members’ relationships and other important relationships with the placed child; and be able to use casework strategies that engage families in the planning of, and participation in, visits.
• Understand the fragile process of reunifying families and use strategies to promote reunification.
• Understand the personal psychological stresses associated with placement and casework, and be able to identify strategies to prevent emotional distress and burnout.