Vol. 18, No. 1 • November 2013

Project Broadcast: Bringing Trauma-Informed Practice to NC's Child Welfare System

Project Broadcast is a five year grant awarded to the NC Department of Health and Human Services, Division of Social Services. It strives to improve the well-being of children and families through the development of a trauma-informed child welfare system. Funded through the Department of Health and Human Services, Administration for Children and Families, Children's Bureau (Grant # 90CO1058) through September 2016, this project will invest over $625,000 each year toward implementing trauma-informed practices.

The project selected nine demonstration counties (Buncombe, Craven, Cumberland, Hoke, Pender, Pitt, Scotland, Union, and Wilson) to begin this very important work. The plan is to learn from these counties how best to implement trauma-informed practices and then incorporate these practices statewide.

To assist them in creating a trauma-informed child welfare system, Project Broadcast has outlined five primary strategies:

1. Develop a trauma-informed workforce. This includes foster, adoptive, kinship and therapeutic parents, child welfare staff, and the broader child serving organizations such as schools, law enforcement, domestic violence, courts, etc. By using training developed by the National Child Traumatic Stress Network (NCTSN), our workforce will be able to apply trauma-informed practices to improve the lives of the children they serve.
   
   
2. Increase the number of clinicians able to provide trauma-informed, evidence-based treatment. Clinicians will be trained via the North Carolina Child Treatment Program (NC-CTP) in the following treatment interventions:
   • Attachment and Bio-Behavioral Catch-up (ABC)
   • Parent-Child Interaction Therapy (PCIT)
   • Trauma-Focused Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (TFCBT)
   • Structured Psychotherapy for Adolescents Responding to Chronic Stress (SPARCS)
     
     
3. Increase the public's access to clinicians. Do you know who in your county provides good quality mental health treatment? We will expand the NC-CTP ‘rostering' process to include the above treatment models. You will be able to visit www.ncchildtreatmentprogram.org and find a therapist in your area.
   
   
4. Increase the ability of child-serving agencies to share data. There are many agencies working toward helping children, but they do not always talk to each other. Our project strives to improve our ability to access the necessary data we need to effectively work with children.
   
   
5. Ensure our state and local policies are trauma-informed. These policies include things such as screening children for trauma, and developing a system that can monitor and treat the emotional trauma associated with the child's maltreatment and removal from home.

The NC Division of Social Services has partnered with the Center for Child and Family Health, a National Child Traumatic Stress Network site, as well as the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill to assist them on this project. For more information, contact [email protected]; 336/209-5844.

~ Family and Children's Resource Program, UNC-CH School of Social Work ~