| Advocacy Articles |
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Davin Youngclarke, MA Introduction & How to use this document: The contents of this systematic review is abstracted from 11 articles which used data from over 1,400 children and 637 court personnel. Data bases were reviewed using the information below. This document is not intended to take the place of any one's careful search of the research literature regarding specific questions or associations. It is intended to serve as a quick reference for those who want a super summary of some relevant articles (mostly original research) on the effectiveness of CASA. It is important for you to pull the original article if you intend to go out on limb using the summaries that follow. Databases searched: Search Limits: None The Bottom Line: Scientific studies have begun to empirically
demonstrate the effectiveness of CASA in certain areas. A lot more work
needs to be done by scientific types in the field of child welfare; but,
we have data to back up our belief that CASA works!
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Title: "Children in Placement" (CIP): A model for citizen-judicial review Authors: Sue Wert, MS, Edith Fein, MA, & Wendy Haller General findings: Studied three main variables:
Interesting points: Notes: Title: Using lay volunteers to represent children in child protection court proceedings. Authors: Donald Duquette, JD & Sarah Ramsey, JD General findings: 91 cases followed. This is the first demonstration study of the effectiveness of using carefully selected lay volunteers as advocates in juvenile court proceedings! Trained lay volunteers, under lawyer supervision, perform at least as well as trained attorneys and trained law students in representing children in child abuse and neglect legal proceedings. The trained volunteers out performed the untrained attorneys. No differences among the three trained groups. Trained groups outperformed untrained attorneys on the following: less likely to dismiss a case once court jurisdiction was exercised, less likely to make the child a ward of the court, more likely to investigate, resulting in more home placements, more likely to advocate (defined as number of recommendations made, services obtained, and people monitored) resulting in reduced court time and increased treatments and assessments. Interesting points: Notes: Title: Who best represents the interests of the child in court? Authors: John Poertner, DSW & Allan Press, PhD General findings: 209 cases reviewed. Process variables that showed no difference between CASA & SAM: continuances, placement changes, time child placed out-of-home, time from opening to disposition, number of voluntary dismissals after case opened, number of services to family. Outcome variables that showed no difference: time to final disposition, reentry into judicial system, disposition to abuser. Significant process variables for CASA: time child placed in their own home less, more services identified in court findings. Significant outcome variables for CASA: more adoption (22% vs. 7%), more adoptions for nonwhites. Interesting points: Notes: ______________________________________________________________________________ Title: National evaluation of the impact of Guardian ad Litem in child abuse or neglect judicial proceedings Authors: L. Condelli General findings: CASA alone was better than others on time the child was placed in out-of-home care, average number of changes in case plans per case, average number of hearings where changes in case plans were made. More likely to be placed with sibs and more likely to have adoption as the goal There were no measures on which lay CASA performed significantly less effectively than staff attorneys. Interesting points: Nationwide study Notes: 5 models studied: law school clinic, staff attorneys, paid private attorneys, paid attorney teamed with lay volunteer, unassisted lay volunteer. All information for this summary was gathered from Poertner & Press (1990). ______________________________________________________________________________ Title: Use of Court-Appointed advocates to assist in permanency planning for minority children. Authors: Shareen Abramson, PhD General findings: 122 children as subjects from 56 families. Participants were children who came from non-English speaking homes, of nonwhite ethnicity, or not educated. Children with an advocate were less likely to be placed in long-term foster care and were more likely to be adopted. Interesting points: This one of the only true Randomized Controlled Trials on advocacy! The Fresno Amicus Program was specifically organized to assist in obtaining permanency for minority families and was a member of National CASA Association Notes: 28 amicus families compared to 28 controls-60 vs 62 children. The numbers are low in this study so the confidence intervals must be assumed to be very wide. ______________________________________________________________________________ Title: Is the Court Appointed Special Advocate program effective? A longitudinal analysis of time involvement and case outcomes. Authors: Patrick Leung, PhD General findings: 221 cases reviewed. CASA group reduced length of time of out-of-home care, reduced number of placement changes, higher number of kids returned home. CASA most effective when assigned between pretrial and disposition period. Judges were surveyed and rated CASA high on clear, concise written reports, direct and useful verbal testimony, concrete and thorough case assessments, appropriate recommendations, provided "new" or "breakthrough" information to court. Interesting points: This is the first longitudinal study of CASA (quasi-experimental though). Midwestern county where 1/3 of all cases have advocates Notes: ______________________________________________________________________________ Title: Case advocacy in child welfare Authors: Pat Litzelfelner, PhD & Christopher Petr, PhD General findings: Review article, no data collection. Discusses the difference between social advocacy and case advocacy. Gives a sketchy history of child advocacy and child welfare. Interesting points:
Notes: ______________________________________________________________________________ Title: The effectiveness of Court Appointed Special Advocates to assist in Permanency Planning Authors: Cynthia Calkins, MS & Murray Millar, PhD General findings: 189 cases reviewed. No significant differences were found between comparison groups on demographic variables, that's good. CASA kids had fewer average placements (3.29 vs. 4.55). Shorter time to permanency for CASA (31 months vs. 40 months). There was a trend for increased likelihood of permanency being reunification for the CASA group, although it was not statistically significant (29% vs. 20%); same for percent reaching permanency during the study period (65% vs. 53%). Always interpret trends with caution. Interesting points:
Comments on US Advisory Board on Child Abuse and Neglect (1994) CASA kids spent about 15 months in foster care compared to the average of 27 months Smith (1992) negative findings: CASA kids had more placements and were in care longer before reaching permanency. Leung & Mastrini (1990): no difference in time of out-of-home care for CASA kids but fewer placements. The authors emphasize the positive results found in the current study were associated with CASA involvement within the first three months of detention. Notes: The importance of building evaluations mechanisms into programs is also emphasized ______________________________________________________________________________ Title: The effectiveness of CASAs in achieving positive outcomes for chidlren Authors: Pat Litzelfelner, PhD General findings: 200 cases reviewed. CASA kids had fewer total placements than those without (3.9 vs 6.6). CASA kids also had fewer court continuances (1.1 vs 2.9). Number of services provided was on average higher for the CASA group (8.5 vs 6.4); this one is kind of tough to interpret due to the slippery definition of a service and the assumption that all services are created equal in effectiveness and frequency. A higher percentage of CASA kids were placed in home/relative/adoptive home (62% vs. 33%). A trend was noted that more control group cases closed than CASA cases (32% vs. 41% whoops!); not statistically significant, though, but the trend is worth attending to. Length of time under court jurisdiction also did not show any difference. Interesting points: Case characteristic variable = everything that happens before
removal/detention ______________________________________________________________________________ Title (Dissertation): Court Appointed Special Advocates: Administrative structural impediments to the use of the CASA program by juvenile dependency court judges. Authors: Michael Cook, DPA General findings: 248 cases abstracted. There is a strong association between being severely abused and eventually ending up in the CASA program. White females are the most at-risk group for severe abuse Children who are in the system for longer than 2 years are far less likely to have case dismissed prior to them turning 18. Children in the CASA program (San Bernardino County) are older than non-casa dependency children. Interesting points: Notes: ______________________________________________________________________________ Title: National study of Guardian ad Litem representation Authors: S. S. Aitkin
Interesting points: Notes: ______________________________________________________________________________
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