I have read or listened to for the last time reports maligning my fellow caseworkers in the child welfare system without making a response.
Let me start by simply saying that much of what is reported is slanted, some is outright lies and all is generated with various agendas in mind, none of which is consistent with the protection of children.I am most struck by the hypocrisy of the members of Congress attempting to pass a vindictive child welfare reform act after starving us for resources for the past 10 years and neglecting the interests of children for many years before that. In effect, they blame the workers for their own inaction.
It is impossible to assess the success or failure of an operation when you start out with a preconceived notion. The data studied in a recent legislative audit had little to do with the quality of child care in the state. Some of their basic premises were faulty.
I challenge the concept of children "languishing" in foster care. Can it be called languishing when a child spends the only year or two of its life free from physical or sexual abuse? Would you represent as languishing the development of speech, cognitive and social skills that are absent in the child's family?
Is it the worker's fault that many cases take 12 to 15 months for the original petition to be adjudicated? Is it DFS's fault that prior to 1988 a permanent deprivation petition was virtually unwinnable? I reject the idea that children are abused by the system. Children are abused primarily by their parents if the state has to take charge of the child.
Why are we so determined to relieve parents of their responsibility while castigating a poorly paid social worker? It seems we are fitting neatly into the abusers system of denial. It is true that mistakes are made, but they are honest mistakes without malice, and they are few.
Earma Beasly
Centerville