What Oregon Can Learn From Tennessee's Child Welfare Approach

It’s now common for youth to remain in foster care or residential treatment for years. For troubled or victimized children in need, assistance at home is often more effective than foster placement.

A new tablet, called the Feelif multimedia device, allows blind children to learn braille and geometry and play interactive learning games with their fingers. The device allows children to create drawings and write on a tablet and then feel what they've created in a 3 dimensional way.

The Mason County Housing Options for Students in Transition (HOST) program is filling the county's gap of youth shelters, helping almost 200 homeless youth graduate from high school through personal relationships and screened host families. The program has show particular success in helping homeless youth from marginalized identities, including youth of color and LGBTQ+ identifying youth.

Miami is home to a special type of child welfare program called CHANCE (Citrus Helping Adolescents Negatively Impacted by Commercial Exploitation) that is designed specifically for youth in foster care that have been trafficked. CHANCE has an intensive curriculum that educates foster parents and clinicians about child sex trafficking and child trauma, and families are only allowed to take in one child at a time so that they are prepared for the child's unique health needs. Studies done on the program have found that the youth have significant improvement in many emotional and mental categories.

L’association Basiliade a eu l’idée de reconvertir des hôtels vides en centres d’hébergement social. Elle a nommé l'un d'entre eux la "Maison des Fées". 36 femmes exilées sont hébergées avec leurs bébés. Elles bénéficient d'une solution de garde pour leurs enfants, d'un soutien du personnel de l'hôtel et de travailleurs sociaux.

En Suisse, l’association Appartenances fait appel à 140 interprètes communautaires pour favoriser l'autonomie des personnes migrantes. Leur mission : traduire, certes, mais surtout de dissiper les méprises potentielles dues aux différences culturelles entre une personne migrante et un professionnel de santé ou du social. Ces interprètes ont tous eux-mêmes un parcours migratoire derrière eux qui permet de saisir les nuances entre le pays d’origine de la personne migrante et le pays d’accueil.

Project ACT provides support services to 1,000 Cleveland public school students experiencing homelessness or living with guardians other than their parents. Students are set up with a life skills coach who provides emotional and academic support to cope with traumatic life experiences. To ensure stability during COVID-19, Project ACT distributed hotspots and Chromebooks to all 1,000 children they work with. Life coach sessions transitioned to Zoom, where weekly online tutoring sessions were also hosted. Students could also receive gift cards, enrichment packets, school supplies, and hygiene items if needed.

Trace the Face, un site de la Croix-Rouge, aide les migrants à localiser leurs proches perdus sur la route de l’exil. Depuis 2013, 5 731 photos de personnes recherchant quelqu’un ont été publiées sur Trace the Face et 161 personnes ont pu retrouver un proche.

An app called Visis translates text and photos to speech to help Nigerian people with visual impairments to live their lives independently.

Mr. Dad’s Father’s Club mentors local youth to nurture their social and emotional well-being, making them better equipped to handle the world around them. The Club also provides mentorships for fathers, helping them learn how to be more present in their children’s lives as research indicates the presence of positive role models can make youth more resilient when exposed to violent or negative environments. There are currently over 150 fathers who volunteer for events with the Club.