Destiny Diaz

Ms. Guzman

Ap English Language

Period 4

2 February 2017

Annotated Bibliography: Foster Care Programs For Children

Cox, Tory L. "Improving Educational Outcomes For Children And Youths In Foster Care."
Children & Schools 35.1 (2013): 59-62. Education Research Complete. Web. 18 Jan.
2017.

In the article Cox establishes that children in the foster care system academically
face hardships and are prone to down spirals due to their unstable lifestyles. He then
suggests a way to improve their outcomes by providing programs for children as well as
tutoring and helping them with school involvement. The author begins by revealing that
those in foster care are academically prone to dropping out and being homeless by 18,
after being emancipated. To better help these disadvantaged students, programs are setup
to help them in almost all their levels of education, describes Cox. He then explains that
the students in these programs, receiving the help show huge improvement in short
amounts of time, but to see greater impact of improvement, more research needs to be
conducted, as well as more in programs.

Tory Coxs article on improving academic outcomes for those in foster care gave
very general but useful information. It established the disadvantage of those in foster with
lots of statistics and data, which I plan to use to establish the need for programs to help
these students. As to the actual programs and methods lightly touched on in the piece, I
plan to use this to prove that the simple methods used to help these kids have a huge
impact. This is where I would use the data given of the children's improvement over the
time they were helped, then bring in the idea of if they were helped since their early
childhood, only imagine the changes to a child's life that would be the outcome. As well
as analyzing the idea of the caregivers receiving help from these programs to better
benefit the child. This article did bring up the question of how do the students get access
to these programs? Typically, how long are they in the programs? How do these programs
help them, what are their goals?

Haskins, Ron, Janet Currie, and Lawrence M. Berger. "Can States Improve Children's Health By
Preventing Abuse And Neglect?." Future Of Children (2015): 1-6. Education Research
Complete. Web. 19 Jan. 2017.

The authors argue that state funding gives too much to the foster care system and
too little to preventative programs for children, if this were to switch less children would
be in the system and carry healthier, successful lives. The article describes the goals of
 both the foster care system and existing preventative programs, which are to give children
a safe home for their wellbeing. When children are removed from their homes and put
into the system they are already considered to be at risk since being removed from
something they have called home for so long is a traumatic experience. Especially for the
children who are coming from abusive homes, this change has unknown outcomes. The
authors suggest an alternative method, starting before the need to remove children from
families comes to play, which are enforcing preventative programs so families as a whole
can build better relationships, and better problem solving skills. In this sense, programs
can help stop problems before they grow into endangering a child, ultimately
traumatizing them. Which can actually reduce the number of children going into the
system every year, saving more money and lessen the traumatic experiences kids have in
the system. A switch to funding more preventative programs versus the system can lead
to these outcomes, and not only save money but the lives and families of those impacted.

In this piece the authors, Ron Hopkins and Janet Currie are editors of the Future
of Children, which is an online journal made to provide information of policies and
programs that impact children. It is backed by Princeton University which is where
Currie is a chairperson of the Department of Economics and a director of the Center for
Health and Wellbeing, As for Lawrence M. Berger, he is a professor at the School of
Social Work, with interests in child development and well-being. Considering that the
authors all have a background in the interest of children and family policy what they
argue in this piece is not only accurate but is backed by the logic of preventing problems
before the grow out of hand. They are on the side that favors and benefits the children
and show no biases to the fact that the suggested policy is cheaper. In other words, they
do not show a bias of being money hungry, but rather want to give the children a better
chance at life that the system could not offer. I really want to use this piece to better
explain my argument of how the system should be held accountable for the outcome of
their children, as well as to show how programs can be used to help children before
during and after they are put into the system. I want to use this to explain how Child
Protective Services work to help their children as well as how prevention programs work,
then compare the outcomes of each, to point out how programs are more beneficial than
the system, working only when the child is taken from their home. While reading I began
to question what methods are used in the programs to help the families avoid abuse and
neglect? How will the system work when it has less money? As well as, for those
children who are still removed from their families and put into the system, how do the
programs plan to help these kids?

Scozzaro, Christopher, and Timothy Janikowski. "Mental Health Diagnosis, Medication,

Family Studies 24.9 (2015): 2560-2567. Education Research Complete. Web. 18 Jan.
2017

In a survey conducted by the authors, they researched the demographics of the

children that 200 social workers were responsible for, as well as the services the child is
receiving, the medication they are taking if any, and their placement history. All of which
impact the child's life and how they are treated by the system and society. The finding
concluded that the top three ethnicities of children in the foster care system are African
American, White and Hispanic which is consistent with the United States population.
 They also found that over half of the children were diagnosed with mental health issues,
this is not consistent with a similar aged group who are not in foster care.They also found
that there are more males in the system than females.

Dr. Christopher Scozzaro is a clinical social worker in New York, he has a first
hand experience with kids like those surveyed and can probably back the findings with
his own account. Timothy Janikowski is a director of the counselor education program
who I feel was able to conduct a focused and direct survey with no biases. Both authors
are certified a PH.D in a field relating to counseling, making both credible enough to
accurately create and conduct this survey. As to how I plan to use this article, I want to
use the data to analyze why minorities such as African Americans and Hispanics make up
so much of the children in the system. Also to give data of how many children are
diagnosed with mental health issues and how many are actually helped. As well as how
many of these are given medication to help them. As I read, I questioned how many
children are properly diagnosed and are given proper treatment? How do caregivers and
parents help better the child? Lastly, do these demographics and diagnoses change how
the are placed in homes or are treated by the system?

Slayter, Elspeth M. "Foster Care Outcomes For Children With Intellectual Disability."
Intellectual & Developmental Disabilities 54.5 (2016): 299-315. Education Research
Complete. Web. 18 Jan. 2017.

Slayter describes the typical outcome for a child in the foster care system with a
disability to be at a risk of abuse and neglect, being removed from their family, lower
level education and homelessness. She details how these children are constantly at a
disadvantage since they lack the needed help to improve their capabilities. She argues
that even before they are put into the system parents have little to no training of how they
themselves can help their child. This ignorance leads to maltreatment, even stressors that
can lead to abuse. Which is where the child is placed into Child Protective Services,
where there they have little to no help from programs that can improve their skill set. In
fact, they are put at a greater risk since while in the system they move around a lot,
causing a lack of strong bonds in school or society which only worsen their situation. Due
to all of this traumatizing experiences, the child is also set back with less of a chance of
being adopted due to the more training and situations brought up when caring for
someone with special needs. The author calls for the attention to be brought to the
children's needs and provide more programs designed to help the child to fit their needs
specifically.

The author is a professor at the School of Social Work specifically researching the
disability services available, so when she argues that there is a need for more programs
for children in the foster care system, I find she is a reliable source. I plan to use this
article when I begin to narrow down the focus of my essay from all children in the
system, to those with special needs. I want to use it specifically, to prove that children
with illnesses have an even greater disadvantage at a successful life. I want to analyze
how they are treated in the system and how programs if available can make a huge impact
in how they develop as adults. If programs are made accessible to the kids, they can learn
necessary skills to lead a healthy life, as well as better academically if tutoring programs
 are offered. Education and strong skill sets are major keys to success in any life,
especially in one of a foster care child, which they could later use to get a job, even have
stronger relationships. Programs like this can help close the gap between foster kids and
other kids their age that are not in foster care. Which can lead to future generations have a
smaller or even no gap at all, in fact one day ideally these two groups of kids will be
equal.

Zakirova, Venera G., Guzel I. Gaysina, and Asia Zhumabaeva. "Program Of Adaptation
Assistance In Foster Families And Particular Features Of Its Implementation."
International Journal Of Environmental And Science Education 10.4 (2015):
553-559. ERIC. Web. 18 Jan. 2017.

In this article, the authors elaborate on the need to support children in foster care
as well as the foster parents to better ensure successful lives for the children. The United
States is not alone in the issue of having foster children at a disadvantage with little help.
The article discusses a pilot programs created to help the child and parent establish their
issues together and individually through therapy and trust activities to better their
relationship as a part of this research. Within a year, the researchers saw a better, stronger,
and healthier relationship as well as better developed children. The authors do explain
that the teens had a slower recovery due to the fact that they lack coping skills.

Zakirova has a degree in psychology which must have been helpful in analyzing
the children and parents during the pilot programs. The authors show little to no biases
throughout their research. The research process was logical and easy to follow. The
programs helped the foster families become closer and unite as one. This piece despite
being based in Russia, is helpful in the sense that it proves that children and families
benefit from programs. I am not sure if I plan to use this mainly because the data is only
based for Russia, but if I did I would use it just to prove that small programs go a long
way for foster families. A year with a program like this could change both the child and
caregiver's life. I wonder that if more programs like this were available to children and
their families would there be less children in foster care? Would more kids be adopted?
Would they bounce from caregiver to caregiver less?