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.

If you are interested in our series and learning experiences, please use our search bar or explore our topics.

Explore our resources below and filter them as you need.

Showing 1 - 15 of 24 resources
Video

Frankie is 14 years old and lives with his sister, brothers, and moms. He and his sister were adopted when they were 2 years old and 4 years old, respectively. He loves spending time with his aunts, uncles, and cousins and loves being part of a big family.

Video

Learn about negotiating boundaries, communication, support, and normalcy from a young person formally in foster care and her adoptive parents.

PDF

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

PDF

Assists agencies to evaluate how well the services in an area of their choice follow the Youth Welfare approach.

PDF

Assists readers in exploring the Youth Welfare approach to service provision in the area of health care.

Video

Shares Stephen’s story about being a community-based provider and policymaker in Florida, the need for laws that empower caregiver decision-making, creating Florida’s reasonable and prudent parent standard (RPPS), and the effect RPPS and normalcy laws can have on foster care.

PDF

Learn about the Youth Welfare approach, which outlines how agencies can shift from a child-focused system to a youth-focused system.

PDF

Assists agencies to evaluate how well the services in an area of their choice follow the Youth Welfare approach.

PDF

Suggests examples of service provision for youth in foster care in the area of financial literacy and describes how those services can be improved using a “Good-Better-Best” continuum approach.

Video

Hear a first-hand account of a kinship and adoptive mother raising her nephew, fulfilling roles as both aunt and primary caregiver.

Video

Hear about the challenges and successes and how Donaniece is teaching her grandson the meaning of family.

Video

Shares Molene’s story about becoming the primary caregiver for her four nieces, raising them, adopting them, negotiating the child welfare system, and creating a family.

Video

Bruce and Brenda have been married for 33 years and have four daughters. From 2006 to 2009, they provided a kinship placement for their four grandchildren. In 2010, the couple adopted Bruce (now 18 years old), Tre’Nae (now 15 years old), Mason (now 13 years old), and Kiaunna (now 10 years old).

PDF

Hear about the challenges and experiences of an adoptive family and how they created belonging, healthy development, and normal experiences.

PDF

This handout is part of the series, “Perspectives on Normalcy: Videos and Discussion Questions.” It is designed to facilitate discussion about the issues raised in the video, “Kinship Adoption: You Get a Call, ‘Do You Want These Kids?’”