Child Welfare
The Neward Star-Ledger reports that the court-appointed monitor for New Jersey’s child welfare agency has asked the state to release more details about the agency’s involvement with the family of an 8-year-old girl who died last month of malnutrition and untreated broken leg. The monitor and Advocates for Children also want the state to determine why there have been fewer confirmed abuse and neglect complaints. The family of the dead girl had been investigated four times between 2004 and 2006 and all were determined to be unfounded.
Doug Brunk of the Internal Medicine News Digital Network reports on research findings on which professionals are best able to interpret medical findings in child sex abuse cases.
Child deaths related to abuse and neglect are down according to data from 2009 and 2008, reports Will Higgins of the Indianapolis Star.
A background check on a Florida day care provider and foster parent did not reveal an abusive past, reports Jackelyn Barnard of First Coast News. The agency that conducted the check , the Florida Department of Law Enforcement, said the case is an outlier.
Christina Villacorte of Los Angeles’ Daily News continues to report on the recently deceased case worker who managed to steal thousands from teens aging out of foster care. Yesterday, Villacorte focused her piece on one young man who was stunned to find out that the case worker, Andre Toliver, had stolen almost $5,000 the teen had earned working at Starbucks. Click here for an earlier piece by Villacorte on the subject.
Pennsylvania needs to speed up its annual process of rate-setting for private providers in the child welfare arena, opines Youth Services of Pennsylvania President Judy Happ in the Morning Call.
Three Catholic Charities groups operating foster care and adoption in Illinois are seeking an emergency injunction that would allow them to turn away couples in civil unions, reports Manya Brachear of the Chicago Tribune. Other Catholic Charities programs in the state have simply shut down their foster care and adoption programs in the state after a law allowing civil unions took effect in May.
Education/Jobs
A lack of summer jobs now will mean an incoming workforce with lousy work attitudes later, writes columnist Susan Tompor of the Detroit Free Press.
Despite the headline here, a lukewarm outlook on summer jobs is reported by Kate Rogers of FoxBusiness.com: 71,000 new 16- to 19-year-olds were employed in May, which is way more than last May and way less the ten-year average for May.
Juvenile Justice
Jessica Williams interviews Sharon Smith for the Juvenile Justice Information Exchange. Smith formed MOMSTELL to advocate for better family-involved drug treatment after her daughter, a heroin addict who was in and out of treatment centers, died of an overdose in 1998.
