Resource Library

The Center for States designs products, services, and learning experiences to increase understanding and awareness, and build knowledge and skills. The Center focuses its attention on developing products and resources on several core organizational and practice topics.

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The Center for States provides research assistance and responds to information requests on building capacity in child welfare.

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Showing 1 - 15 of 39 resources
Video

Highlights the role agency resources and family support can play in helping kinship families face challenges. This video discusses an aunt's decision to become a full-time caregiver for her niece and her niece's daughter, and the importance home visits played in the transition.

Publication Year 2018
PDF

Use this guide for tips, and strategies concerning the critical role leadership plays in creating and sustaining positive organizational culture.

Publication Year 2019
PDF

Adapt proven strategies from this publication to improve specific areas of culture and that support collaborative development of an effective service array.

Publication Year 2019
PDF

Adapt strategies from this publication to improve specific areas of culture and climate to support partnering with families after conducting an assessment.

Publication Year 2019
PDF

Get guidance, tips, and strategies for assessing agency culture and climate. 

Publication Year 2019
Infographic

Browse the themes and key takeaways from the How We Partner With the Community to Improve Service Options podcast series.

Publication Year 2019
Video

Examines why teams should understand the factors influencing readiness, use a structured approach to develop and conduct readiness assessments, and analyze results. This video helps teams understand what needs to be in place before assessing readiness and sets up teams for success as part of a change and implementation process at a child welfare agency.

Publication Year 2018
Video

Explores how the factors of motivation, general capacity, and intervention-specific capacity influence agency readiness for change. This video provides examples of and considerations for conducting readiness assessments.

Publication Year 2018
Video

Presents factors that may impact plans to conduct an assessment, how teams can clearly communicate the need for the readiness assessment, and what teams need to consider before conducting an assessment.

Publication Year 2018
Video

Explores how the factors of motivation, general capacity, and intervention-specific capacity influence agency readiness for change. This video provides examples of and considerations for conducting readiness assessments.

Publication Year 2018
Video

Reviews the final tasks of assessing agency readiness: analyzing results and determining next steps. This video explores how teams analyze assessment results, what conditions or connections help determine next steps, and why teams should reassess over time and at multiple points in the process.

Publication Year 2018
Podcast

Listen to child welfare agency leaders in the District of Columbia, service providers, partners in community collaboratives, and sister agencies talk about how they coordinate service planning and delivery, are culturally responsive to the community, and provide seamless services to families.

Publication Year 2020
Video

Emphasizes the importance of community and caseworker support in having the resources needed to promote family well-being, particularly when caring for children with special needs. This video highlights the perspective of a kinship caregiver who is an Athabaskan native teaching her grandchildren the Navajo culture and community traditions and passing down her grandparents' stories.

Publication Year 2018
Video

Addresses the importance of being open to agency support and resources and the necessity of self-care in working through family transitions and meeting family needs. In this video, a kinship parent caring for her niece's children reflects on her family's strategies for raising children who have experienced trauma and the resources that enabled them to become effective kinship caregivers.

Publication Year 2018
Video

Highlights the significant impact agency staff have on the kinship and foster parent experience and in helping families serve as a resource for the birth families of the children in their care. This video presents one family's story of becoming a kinship resource and how support from their foster care specialist guided their decision.

Publication Year 2018