Quality Parenting Initiative: Engaging Diverse Stakeholders as Champions for Child Welfare Systems Reform

Relationships matter: Exploring the implementation of the Quality Parenting Initiative and the foster parent experience

“…For example, providing training and concrete resources aligns with the professional needs of foster parents, but does little to address their emotional needs. Similar to any working environment, when positive relationships exist between foster parents and agency personnel, foster parents are more involved in the work, satisfied in their role, and encouraged to continue to foster (Lewis et al, 2021; Samrai et al, 2011). Therefore, a better understanding on how to strengthen this relationship is important and can lead to the development and testing of strategies to improve foster parent well‐being and retention.…”

“…Participating child welfare systems (i.e., QPI sites) 'commit to fully supporting excellent parenting by putting first the needs of the child for strong relationships' (Youth Law Center, 2020) and take part in the multi-phased implementation process. The QPI implementation phases (e.g., pre-engagement, preparation, building consensus, identifying challenges and opportunities and implementation), have been described in detail elsewhere (Lewis et al, 2021). An QPI builds on implementation science and decades of experience from colleagues implementing new child welfare services, some of which include incorporating stakeholders at all organizational levelsfrom foster parents to agency leadership and drawing on the practice wisdom of these professionals (Aarons et al, 2009;Annie E. Casey Foundation, 2008;Gopalan et al, 2021).…”

“…The [birth] mom told me that she was really happy to be working with us because all of her friends were in the drug crowd and that drug scene that she was get- often involves significant challenges, some of which include perceived need for resources (Murray et al, 2011;Randle et al, 2017) and navigating the child welfare system (Rosenwald & Bronstein, 2008;Samrai et al, 2011). Additionally, previous studies have highlighted the impact of the foster parent-agency relationship on foster parent satisfaction and retention (Lewis et al, 2021;Pickin et al, 2011;Whenan et al, 2009). In their study of 910 foster parents, Geiger et al (2017) found communication to be the strongest predictor of foster parents' overall level of satisfaction with the child welfare agency, explaining 80% of the variance in satisfaction scores.…”

“…Participating child welfare systems (i.e., QPI sites) ‘commit to fully supporting excellent parenting by putting first the needs of the child for strong relationships’ (Youth Law Center, 2020) and take part in the multi‐phased implementation process. The QPI implementation phases (e.g., pre‐engagement, preparation, building consensus, identifying challenges and opportunities and implementation), have been described in detail elsewhere (Lewis et al, 2021). An essential component of QPI implementation involves collaboration between foster care agencies and local stakeholders (e.g., foster parents, kinship caregivers, birth parents, youth and child welfare workers) to improve the delivery of foster care by aligning policies and practices to reflect QPI's key principles: (1) consistent, excellent parenting and meaningful relationships are the most important services to child and youth in foster care; (2) research on child development and trauma demonstrates the importance of parenting and positive relationships; and (3) the individuals most affected by policies and practices are in the best position to design and implement change (Youth Law Center, 2020).…”