Following our analysis, the Foster America team integrated insights across our methodologies and developed a proposed roadmap for the systems transformation work ahead. Our recommendations are designed to increase families’ access to equitable, timely, holistic, and culturally relevant services, with clear pathways to navigate available resources that prevent child abuse and neglect as well as formal child welfare systems involvement. In the following sections, we share 12 recommendations, organized around the systems-change capacities of co-design, collaboration, finance, and learning. In each, we highlight a central theme, naming the intended result of building capacity in each of these four areas. Here, we offer an overview of the themes before exploring each in greater detail.
CO-DESIGN THEME: ACCESS
Washington State offers varied resources — including concrete economic assistance — to children, youth, and families. This includes offerings directly created or funded by DCYF and offerings generated by other inter-governmental, tribal, and community organizations. While services and supports may exist, families still experience many gaps: in finding the right assistance when and where they need it, in finding assistance that reflects their real needs and cultures, and even in benefiting from the services they do receive. Many families face barriers accessing available resources, despite their existence and potential impact. Co-design should play a central role in bridging these gaps in access, ensuring that families and communities are actively involved in shaping prevention strategies and service offerings. To improve families’ access to support they truly need and want, we recommend taking steps to ensure community voice and lived-experience perspectives guide decisions related to prevention. We suggest strategies for building family and lived-expert advisory structures, with the future goal that prevention offerings are rooted in the actual experiences of those who are today unnecessarily impacted by the child welfare system.
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