Please join us online for a free webinar:

Forum on Differential Response (Family Assessment in Minnesota)

Featuring three national experts:

• Dr. Judith Rycus is the lead author of the Field Guide to Child Welfare, published by the Child Welfare League of America and recognized as the League’s all time best selling child welfare resource textbook.  She is also co-founder of the Institute for Human Services in Columbus, Ohio, and of the North American Resource Center for Child Welfare. These organizations have a mission of promoting large scale system change in the field of child welfare. 

• Kathryn Piper is the chief author of a December 2019 paper which presented a comprehensive survey of states’ current implementation of Differential Response. She is an attorney who represented children and parents in child protection proceedings for twenty years in Vermont, and subsequently received her doctorate in social policy from Brandeis University where she wrote her dissertation on Differential Response.  She is a Research Consultant for the American Professional Society on the Abuse of Children (APSAC). 

• Frank Vandervort is a Clinical Professor of Law at the University of Michigan law school.  In 2009 he cofounded the Juvenile Justice Clinic.  He has written extensively on Differential Response.  His primary interests include juvenile justice, child welfare, and interdisciplinary practice. Professor Vandervort is the immediate past president of APSAC and chair of its Amicus and Public Policy Committee.

Wed, June 10th, 2020 --- 2:30 PM - 4:00 PM (CDT)

More details:

These experts will speak to the origins and strengths of Differential Response, the reasons many states have recently discontinued or scaled back on it, questions about the reliability of evaluations that have been used to support it, and political factors that contributed to its widespread and rapid implementation.  They will discuss some specific concerns that Safe Passage and others have raised about Family Assessment in Minnesota, including as its use for high-risk cases and the practice of interviewing children in the presence of alleged perpetrators.  The panel will also present a vision for moving forward which would retain the positive aspects of DR while addressing safety concerns.  

This will be a 50 minute presentation followed by ample time for questions.

This event is free and everyone is invited to participate.

Please click above to register to join us!

Looking forward to "seeing" you!
- All of us at Safe Passage for Children of Minnesota

Visit our homepage at safepassagemn.org
Email us at: [email protected]