Community Partnership for Protecting Children

The Community Partnership for Protecting Children in Jacksonville, Florida, has helped empower local residents to support their neighbors, while transforming the way that the child welfare agency serves families. Jacksonville first received funding from the Edna McConnell Clark Foundation in 1996 to plan a community partnership model to protect the welfare of children. With continued support from the Foundation and the state Department of Children and Families, the Partnership set up a full-service counseling and referral center in a high school and targeted five local housing developments. After extensive community organizing efforts, the Partnership developed a Neighborhood Network, a coordinating body that includes government agencies, service agencies, churches, grassroots associations, and civic groups. Through innovative community casework, community members, counselors, and social workers help parents at risk of child abuse and neglect to discuss their strengths and goals and then to receive the supports necessary to achieve them. Notably, the Partnership model, known as the "Individualized Course of Action," encourages individuals to set their own goals, rather than receiving a service plan from outside professionals.

The goal of this program is to change the child protection field by demonstrating a new approach to safeguarding children and supporting families. Based on the premise that many people, agencies, and organizations in a community can contribute to children's safety, the initiative addresses child abuse and neglect by raising neighborhood awareness of child safety issues, empowering neighborhood residents to become more involved with families at risk of abusing or neglecting their children, strengthening locally based organizations and helping them form networks concerned with child safety, and fostering policy, practice, and organizational changes within public sector child protective services agencies. This approach is known as community child protection.

Approximately 10 percent of the residents of two key housing projects have been directly engaged in the Partnership's work, either by helping needy families or attending community events. By respecting individuals and their communities, the Partnership has broken down barriers between the community and government agencies. The Partnership has also increased the level of community activism and volunteerism, thereby improving the capacity of the community to serve at-risk families.