Flaws (Blog Post # 3)

Child protective services, a division within state and local social services, is at the center of every community’s child protection efforts (DePanfilis, D. & Salus, M.K., 2003). Texas’s child protective services is responsible for investigating child abuse and neglect, providing services to children and their families, placing children in adoptive homes, placing children in foster care, and helping foster youth  make a smooth transition into adulthood ( Texas Department of Family and Protective Services, 2013).   http://www.dfps.state.tx.us/child_protection/.

If these are the goals of CPS, I wonder if child abuse and neglect continues to occur after  children are taken out of there abusive homes and placed into foster care. I recently came across an article that accuses Texas of poorly supervising children while in foster care. Meanwhile a class action lawsuit that was filed in 2011 on behalf of nine Texas children is now in pursuit for the poor supervision of foster children in Texas (Wilson, 2013). The New York-based Children’s Rights group is behind the push for justice for more than 12,000 abused and neglected Texas children that were permanently removed from their natural homes (Wilson, 2013). Executive Director Marcia Robinson Lowry said the child rights group has sued more than 15 states for “mistreatment of foster children” and lost just two of those cases (Wilson, 2013). Two-year old Alexandria Hill was killed under the care of Texas CPS by her foster mom sometime last month (Wilson, 2013). Texas mentor, the agency responsible for placing Alexandria with foster mom Small, is the third largest foster care contractor in the state, records show that one of its offices in Arlington has been under evaluation for the past six months(Wilson, 2013). http://www.infowars.com/lawsuit-accusing-texas-of-poorly-supervising-foster-children-moves-forward/\

If CPS aim is to reduce child abuse and neglect why are children still being harmed after they are taken out of homes where they are already experiencing such trauma. After reading this article I felt upset with the system mainly because it has taken 2 years for the government to do something about this situation. The child protective services system in Texas still has flaws in it and it seems as though they are failing at their mission. Just like any other state facility (CPS) has a lot of flaws within it and conditions that could be changed, especially when placing children in foster care, in this case. One thing that could change is the extensive background checks that they do on foster care and adoptive families before placing children into these families. State funding for CPS has been increased twice over the past eight years (Wilson, 2013) so why hasn’t the system been effective in reducing its flaws and improving its care for abused and neglected children?
                                                                         Observation
Research Brown Bag is putting on a presentation Tuesday, October 1 from 1-2pm. The presentation will feature investigators from the Child and Family Research Institute. They will provide an overview of their initiatives which will allow you to learn about their work and discuss your ideas.