Organizing Your Work Jeff Griffin Senior Social Services Supervisor County of Orange Children and Family Services February 27, 2008

Organizing Your Work: Discovery The initial search for family members. Discovery can include (but not limited to): Reviewing case files (Mining), Internet searching. Internet searching helps to locate family that can give you credible “real live” information about other family members. Interviews with social worker, CASA, youth, caregivers and currently known family interviews. Discovery can continue throughout the process of reconnecting youth as more family is located and can be asked about more family members.

Discovery: What Do We Do With The Information Gathered? Our goal is to locate and engage the healthy members of a family that are willing to love and support their kin. Who Do You Contact First? What do we know about families? Who generally unconditionally loves children in their family? Who will respond to your call/visit? Who has demonstrated success in this family with raising children? During case mining and interviews, who was connected to the youth in the past but that connection has been lost? Who does the youth want you to locate? Ways To Contact Family: Phone calls (if you have phone numbers). Send letter to family members (registered mail) Visits to family residence/location.

Organizing Your Work: What Information Do You Want To Get During Your Contact With Family? Organize your thoughts about what information you want to get out of the contact with family. Explain to family the purpose of the call/interview. Gather information that in and of itself will be helpful for the youth to know about family. If visiting family in person, take a picture of the youth with you and take pictures of the family/home environment of the family interviewed. Gauge interest in contact with youth. If interested, see if family is willing to immediately engage the youth through phone call/letter/ . Who is the historian of the family? Who organized the family parties/reunions? Names/addressed/phone numbers of at least 3 other family members to contact that may be interested in knowing or helping the youth. An immediate sense of urgency is created upon first contact with family. If family has expressed a desire to connect with youth, you must implement the plan of engagement immediately and do not wait!!

Organizing Your Work: Preparing For Youth/Family Engagement Many times family is reconnecting with youth after not being in their lives for many years. Some family and youth may fall back into patterns of interacting they had prior to their separation. Youth and family members may not know how to interact with each other after years of absence. Talk with youth and family to prepare them for the phone call/visit and set parameters about what can be discussed during the contact. Ensuring that the youth is ready for the reintroduction of family is important as is ensuring that the engagement process is well thought out and implemented. Set the first contact(s) up for a win-win experience for everyone involved.

Organizing Your Work: Preparing For Youth/Family Engagement (Continued) Visit: Set the meeting environment in a place and structure it in a way that both youth and family understand the context of the environment and know how to behave in such an environment. The meeting should occur in a safe environment for the youth as he/she is the most vulnerable member of the engagement process. It may not be appropriate to discuss long term placement options or goals for family re-involvement, but rather plans like when the next visit and/or phone call will occur. Involve the youth’s current care provider and treatment team in the re-engagement process and ensure that the team is supportive and/or understands the importance of having family in the youth’s life. The goal of reconnecting youth with family is to develop sustainable and durable relationships that will last across time. Setting the expectations of the relationship too high and too early in their reconnection can lead to the breakdown of these newly formed relationships.

Organizing Your Work: Planning The goal of reconnecting youth with family is to develop sustainable and durable relationships that will lass across time. This may lead to placement and a legal arrangement in the future. Develop a plan with the youth and family on how the relationship can continue across time. Carefully consider the process in which family and youth are able to manage and continue their relationships across time. Is it regular letter writing, phone calls, visits?. Don’t be afraid to discuss the process and timeline for family re-involvement with family if you feel they are moving too fast (or too slow) Consider using agency resources such as Wraparound and Mental Health to help develop a sustainable relationship between youth and family.