New Tool Kit Helps Leaders Communicate the Benefits of Family First Law

The Annie E. Casey Foun­da­tion has devel­oped a down­load­able tool kit to help child wel­fare lead­ers, advo­cates, pri­vate providers and oth­ers talk about how the Fam­i­ly First Pre­ven­tion Ser­vices Act can help improve out­comes for chil­dren and families.

Young peo­ple involved in the child wel­fare sys­tem do best in fam­i­lies, in a safe and sta­ble envi­ron­ment that sup­ports their long-term well-being, accord­ing to research. The pas­sage of Fam­i­ly First took a large step toward this vision by restruc­tur­ing how the fed­er­al gov­ern­ment spends mon­ey on child wel­fare to ensure that more chil­dren in fos­ter care are placed with fam­i­lies. The law also pro­vides more sup­port for crit­i­cal ser­vices, such as men­tal health and sub­stance abuse treat­ment, in-home train­ing and fam­i­ly ther­a­py that can help pre­vent the need for fos­ter care in the first place.

Read more about how Fam­i­ly First will change the child wel­fare system

The tool kit fea­tures talk­ing points for agency staff, guid­ance for media inter­views and text to incor­po­rate in pub­lic remarks. Casey encour­ages child wel­fare agency staff to pick and choose which resources can help them con­fi­dent­ly com­mu­ni­cate about the goals of Fam­i­ly First and how it works.

The tool kit includes:

• Fam­i­ly First: Talk­ing Points Memo, a four-page doc­u­ment that pro­vides a vari­ety of bul­let points from which agency staff can choose;
• Mes­sage Box, a tool that helps staff when par­tic­i­pat­ing in media inter­views or mak­ing remarks in small­er venues not requir­ing a writ­ten speech;
• Fam­i­ly First: The Basics, which describes key ele­ments of the new law and includes links to pieces oth­er groups have devel­oped that staff can use and repro­duce as appropriate;
• Fam­i­ly First: New Funds for Effec­tive Pre­ven­tion Ser­vices, a guide that spells out the vari­ety of child wel­fare pro­grams now fund­ed with fed­er­al dol­lars for pre­ven­tion services;
• Fam­i­ly First: Address­ing the Opi­oid Epi­dem­ic, which talks about the rela­tion­ship between increas­es in fos­ter care place­ments and sub­stance abuse, includ­ing the opi­oid cri­sis hit­ting some states hard­er than others;
• Fam­i­ly First: Words Mat­ter, which gives tips on how best to frame con­cepts and issues relat­ed to Fam­i­ly First; and
• Fam­i­ly First: Strate­gic Com­mu­ni­ca­tions Tips, which out­lines sug­ges­tions on work­ing with tra­di­tion­al and social media and through tar­get­ed out­lets as a way for reach­ing spe­cial­ized audiences.

“We hope that these tools help child wel­fare lead­ers move toward effec­tive imple­men­ta­tion of the law and a bet­ter future for young peo­ple,” says Tracey Feild, direc­tor of the Foundation’s Child Wel­fare Strat­e­gy Group.