Schedule

  Wright County Human Services, 1004 Commercial Drive,  Buffalo, Minnesota 55313

• Training - Permanency Roundtables: The Value of Permanency
  Description: This training covers what is permanency and why it is important. This training is for individuals who have a key role in achieving permanency for children in foster care, whether through reunification, adoption, or permanent transfer of custody. County and tribal caseworkers, supervisors, managers and directors, judges, county attorneys, parent and child attorneys, GALs, foster parents, private agency staff and child-specific recruiters, and others who play a key role in achieving permanency for children and youth are invited to participate in this training.
  Register through Trainlink 
• Video - Minnesota’s Child Protection System: From the Voices of Refugee Community Members (4-Part Series)
  Description: In this four-part video series interviews are conducted with members from four of Minnesota’s largest refugee communities (Somali, Karen, Oromo, and Nepali-Bhutanese). The videos cover such general topics as the communities’ awareness of child protection services’ mission (or lack thereof), generational differences and their effects on power dynamics within the family structure, a learned distrust of representatives of governments, starkly different notions related to corporal punishment, and important considerations to make when using interpreters.
  Watch the videos
• Reading Material: Best Practices Guide for Families from Refugee Populations 
  Description: This guide is intended as an overview of selected topics that are relevant to providing culturally responsive services to families with refugee backgrounds and understanding their unique needs. General themes were identified through a literature review and interviews with refugee families. The term ‘refugee’ is a broad category that encompasses an extremely diverse group of people with unique cultures, histories, and experiences. This guide is not meant to be exhaustive or representative of every family with a refugee background.
  Minnesota Best Practices guide

Minnesota

• Webinar: The Early Childhood Mental Health System in Minnesota and Opportunities to Partner with Child Welfare
  Description: Join this online forum that will include a brief overview of early childhood mental health systems in Minnesota, key points of intervention and intersection with child welfare, and opportunities for partnering across systems to support families. Child welfare professionals are encouraged to participate with their reflections and experiences, and bring questions to engage with the presenter and peers.
  Presenter: Catherine Wright, PsyD, LP, LPCC, IMH-E®(IV-C)
  Time 10:30am-12:00pm
  Webinar Link
  
  
• Webinar: Relative & Permanency: What You Want to Know
  Description: This training will provide an overview of the permanency process once it is determined that a permanent home is needed for a child in foster care. The main focus will be relative search and notice requirements, how permanency decisions are made (10 best interest factors), and relative's roles within the process.
  Presenters: Elisha Wolfman and Catrina Ankarlo
  Time: 1:00-2:30 pm
  Webinar Link

Minnesota

• Sibling Bill of Rights
  Description: The Minnesota Foster Care Sibling Bill of Rights passed in 2018 is a series of legal provisions designed to preserve and maintain sibling family relationships for youth in foster care. The Bill provides specific permanency planning recommendations which include prioritizing sibling co-placement whenever possible and preserving the sibling relationship when foster care separation does occur. This quick reference card was developed to help child welfare professionals understand this new legislation and includes practice tips for supporting siblings in foster care.
  Foster Care Sibling Bill of Rights Link 
• Webinar: Child Social & Medical History: Roles and Expectations
  Description: A discussion to clarify the purpose of the Social and Medical History and to expand the knowledge of the process. This will include clarifying roles of agencies and what a pre-adoptive parent should expect to receive when considering a pre-adoptive placement.
  Presenter: Catrina Ankarlo
  Time: 9:30-11:00 AM

Webinar Link 

• Reading Material: Motivational Interviewing in Transition Planning: Supporting Youth Transitioning Out of Foster Care 
  Description: There are approximately 442,995 children in foster care in the United States, and a quarter of these young people are age 14 or older. In addition, more than 17,000 young people age out of foster care at age 18 each year. To successfully transition into independent living, youth in care need supportive and healthy adult-youth relationships as well as access to resources and opportunities that can assist them as they work towards independence. Read more form this issue of Practice Notes from the University of Minnesota Center for Advanced Studies in Child Welfare on how you can incorporate Motivational Interviewing into your practice supporting youth.
  Integrating-Motivational Interviewing in Case Planning with Youth in Foster Care (PDF)

• Training – Conducting Home studies and Matching Children with Families
  Time: 9:00am-4:00pm
  Description: This two-day course helps provide new workers with strategies to: engage prospective resource families in a mutual assessment process; identify families who will have a high probability of long-term success in parenting children who are adopted, are in foster or are in Permanent Transfer of Physical and Legal Custody (Kinship care); and provide assessment criteria needed to complete the Minnesota Adoption and Foster Care Study. Assessors will receive strategies to assess the social and emotional functioning of children, their developmental needs, and readiness for adoptive/TLPC placement. Finally, the workshop presents information regarding selection and matching in foster care, adoption and TLPC, including clarification of the requirements of both the Indian Child Welfare Act, the Multi-Ethnic Placement Act and the Minnesota Indian Family Preservation Act.
  This training is not a technical training on how to complete a home study. It is a training to prepare workers on how to properly interview and engage the potential family to obtain accurate and sufficient information to produce a well-written and accurate home study as well as how to assess the needs of children and use the home study to match children with families.
  Register through TrainLink
• Video: Youth Connections Scale
  Description: This module reviews the current research that discusses the importance of youth connections with caring adults. It provides an overview of the Youth Connections Scale that was developed and pilot tested by CASCW in partnership with Anu Family Services. It also reviews how this scale can be implemented in practice. The scale and scoring directions are freely available for your use.
  Watch video and access materials

  Zion Lutheran Church, 1200 Highway 25 S, Buffalo, Minnesota 55313

Unconference hosted by Wright County | 9 a.m. - 3 p.m. 

A conference organized, structured and led by the people attending it and the issues that matter to them. This one-day event will feature opportunities for participants to engage in discussion, networking, and reflection.  The agenda could consist of multiple peer-driven workshops, large and small group discussions, and regional focus areas. Bring your questions, experiences, and expertise and get ready to experience conferencing in a whole new way.

• Training - Conducting Home Studies and Matching Children and Families Day 2 (must register for both days)
  Description: This two-day course helps provide new workers with strategies to: engage prospective resource families in a mutual assessment process; identify families who will have a high probability of long-term success in parenting children who are adopted, are in foster or are in Permanent Transfer of Physical and Legal Custody (Kinship care); and provide assessment criteria needed to complete the Minnesota Adoption and Foster Care Study. Assessors will receive strategies to assess the social and emotional functioning of children, their developmental needs, and readiness for adoptive/TLPC placement. Finally, the workshop presents information regarding selection and matching in foster care, adoption and TLPC, including clarification of the requirements of both the Indian Child Welfare Act, the Multi-Ethnic Placement Act and the Minnesota Indian Family Preservation Act.
  This training is not a technical training on how to complete a home study. It is a training to prepare workers on how to properly interview and engage the potential family to obtain accurate and sufficient information to produce a well-written and accurate home study as well as how to assess the needs of children and use the home study to match children with families.
  Register through TrainLink
  Time: 9:00 am - 4:00 pm
  Location: Olmsted County Community Services, 2117 Campus Dr. SE, Rochester, MN 55904