	Child and Family Development and Support Services

Introduction

Administration and Management

Service Delivery Administration Standards

Service Standards

PA-CFD 3: Assessment

Families participate in a comprehensive, individualized, strengths-based, family-focused, culturally responsive assessment.

Note: Refer to the Assessment Matrix for additional assessment criteria. The elements of the matrix can be tailored according to the needs of specific individuals or service design.

NA The agency provides only parent education groups.

PA-CFD 3.01

Personnel who conduct assessments are qualified by relevant training, skill, and experience and can recognize individuals and families with special needs.

Note: See Research Note to PA-CFD 10.04.

PA-CFD 3.02

The information gathered for assessments is comprehensive, directed at concerns identified in the initial screening, and limited to material pertinent for meeting service requests and objectives.

PA-CFD 3.03

Assessments are conducted in a culturally responsive manner and are the basis for identifying resources that can increase service participation and support the achievement of agreed upon goals.

Interpretation: Culturally responsive assessments can include attention to geographic location, language of choice, and family members’ religious, racial, ethnic, and cultural backgrounds. Other important factors that contribute to a responsive assessment include attention to age, sexual orientation, and developmental level.

PA-CFD 3.04

Assessments are completed within timeframes established by the agency and are updated periodically.

PA-CFD 3.05

Standardized assessment tools are used to:

identify family strengths and protective factors;
assess for needs and risk factors associated with poor child, individual, and family outcomes; and
assess child development.

Interpretation: The assessment of a child’s development should consider his or her strengths, challenges, functional status, and social competence. Service providers should work with families to better understand a child’s strengths and needs, and informed clinical opinion can be used when standardized measures will not accurately reflect a child’s developmental status.

QUICK JUMP TO


	PURPOSE: Families participating in Child and Family Development and Support Services delivered through strong community partnerships gain new competencies, improve child health and well-being, improve family functioning, and make family-community connections.

RELATED FILES


	FAMILY Two or more people who consider themselves family and who assume obligations, functions, and responsibilities generally essential to healthy family life. Child care and child socialization, income support, long-term care, and other caregiving are among the functions of family life. The definition of "family" will rest with an individual's indication of who plays a family member role, including current or former foster family, adoptive family, extended family members, fictive kin, or significant others. Organizations that believe family is the central constellation in a child's life, and that family attachments are of primary importance for human development, will strive to work with professional staff to develop a common understanding of "family."


	SERVICE One or more organization-operated programs or activities that have a common general objective and deploy the organization's material and human resources in a planned and systematic manner. An organization that publicly promotes or identifies itself in writing as offering a service, is licensed to deliver a service, assigns personnel and/or space to a service, or allocates financial resources to a service is considered to offer that service.


	COMMUNITY A specific group of people living in the same locality and who may share a common culture, values, and norms. Communities can also be defined by race, religion, ethnicity, age, occupation, political status, tribal affiliation, interest in particular problems or outcomes, or other common bonds. The term "community" encompasses worksites, schools, tribes, residential neighborhoods, business districts, recreational areas, and health and human service sites.


	ASSESSMENT An evaluation, which utilizes professional expertise and skills in the collection and analysis of data to understand and describe the nature of service needs of an individual, family, or group. Assessment, as in needs assessment, is also used to determine priorities of program planning and service development for the organization as a whole. See also DIAGNOSIS.


	CRITERIA Systematically developed, objective, and quantifiable statements used to assess the appropriateness of specific decisions, services, and outcomes.


	PERSONNEL The body of employees and/or volunteers that carries out the organization's tasks under the organization's administration and/or supervision. This definition does not include foster parents who are specifically referenced in relevant standards


	TRAINING Instruction so as to make fit, qualified, or proficient in a skill or body of knowledge.


	SPECIAL NEEDS A designation used in reference to conditions or characteristics of a person that reflect a need for special care, services, or treatment. When the term is used in the context of adoption services, special needs refers to conditions that make a child harder to place for adoption. This includes children who are members of sibling groups, older children, children with disabilities, children of certain racial /ethnic backgrounds, etc. When the term is used in the context of foster care it refers to the need for a higher degree of specialized case services and attention due to mental and physical disabilities. When the term is used in the context of out-of-school time services, a child or youth may have special physical, behavioral, medical, emotional, or cognitive needs that should be addressed or accommodated. The term is also used in other contexts. See also DEVELOPMENTAL DISABILITIES.


	RESEARCH For purposes of COA accreditation, all forms of internal or external research involving persons served except internal program evaluation and outcomes research, or educational projects performed by students and interns that are part of their professional training.


	OBJECTIVE A sub-goal stated in operational terms, i.e., a statement that makes clear what expected results are to be measured or assessed.


	CLINICAL The study, assessment, and diagnosis of the client situation followed by direct treatment to help the client achieve prescribed goals.