| dc.description.abstract | In this report results are presented from a study of collaboration between day care institutions and the Child Welfare Authorities, commissioned by the Ministry of Education and Research and the Ministry of Children and Equality. The results have been utilized in work with a new White Paper about quality in day care institutions. At the outset, the main issues were: Why day care institutions notify the Child Welfare Authorities fairly seldom compared to others What routines day care institutions have for dealing with cases where abuse or neglect is suspected An electronically based survey elicited responses from 563 leaders of a sample of public and private day care institutions in 51 Norwegian municipalities and local areas. They were chosen to ensure reasonable participation from small (5.000-9.000 inhabitants), medium large (10.000-19.000 inhabitants) and large (>20.000) areas all over the country. The response rate was 53,9 per cent, with a slight majority of publicly owned day care institutions represented. In addition supplementary interviews were done with five day care institutions from large and small areas, with both privately and publicly owned institutions. Almost all the leaders (94 %) reported that the day care institutions had routines of the kind sought after in the second issue above. Around two thirds had written routintes, slightly more of the privately owned institutions. If a possible connection between the existence of routines and the rate of notifications from day care institutions to the Child Welfare Authorities should be investigated more closely, one should rather ask whether the routines are used, and whether they function appropriately. In addition there is a question of whether existing routines are good enough for cases that are not clear-cut, where it is more difficult to find out if there are grounds for worry, while the situation is not serious enough to elicit a mandated report. Almost all the respondents (96 %) have pedagogical education (cf. the Day Care Act Section 17), while almost 85 % of the pedagogical leaders have (cf. the Day Care Act Section 18 with corresponding rules for those working in day care institutions). Accordingly, the relatively low rates of notification from the day care institutions to the Child Welfare Authorities cannot be explained by a putative lack of employees with pedagogical education. Between a fifth and a fourth (22 %) of the leaders answered that they had notified the Child Welfare Authorities about one or several children this kindergarten year (from autumn 2008). Largely, this corresponds to the rates given by Statistics Norway. As many had never notified the Child Welfare Authorities. At this point there was a statistically significant difference between publicly and privately owned institutions. Almost double the amount of publicly owned day care institutions had notified the Child Welfare Authorities, whild almost three times as many privately owned institutions never had done so. In addisjon 28 per cent of the respondents had children in their institutions where day care was a preventive service according to the Child Welfare Act, while 29 per cent never had. Here the difference between institutions according to ownership was statistically significant as well. While more than double the amount of publicly owned day care institutions had children on those grounds, three times as many privately owned institutions had never done so. Not surprisingly there was also a statistically significant correlation between having notified the Child Welfare Authorities and having received children as a preventive child welfare service. Among those who hade notified the authorities this year, 41 % had received children as a preventive service as well. Among those who had never notified the authorities, 48 % had never received childrenasapreventiveservice. These results alone indicate that privately owned day care institutions, which comprise 55 % of Norwegian day care institutions, is a very important area for further development of collaboration between day care institutions and the Child Welfare Authorities. Publicly owned day care institutions receive more children with disabilities and more children with minority backgrounds. As demonstrated above publicly owned institutions receive more children as a preventive child welfare service. They collaborate more often with other helping services except the School Psychological Service. On the other hand parents depending on disability pensions or parents with minority background are rarely members of private companies with rights of place in a particular day care institution, but they have priviliged places in publicly owned institutions. On the other hand there is probably little reason to state generally that the groups of children in privately owned day care institutions differ from those in publicly owned institutions in ways that can explain the differences we found. The amount of privately owned institutions is too large for this. Rather, a probable explanation is that a great deal of variation exists between the two types of institutions. Thus an important challenge for the municipalities is to formulate general and systematic routines for collaboration with the Child Welfare Authorities, in accordance with existing regulations, also including privately owned day care institutions. It is important to discuss the question of cases eliciting worry more in depth. One the one hand cases exist where it is fairly easy to conclude that a report is mandated (cf. the Day Care Act, Section 22). But on the other hand cases may elicit more unspecified worry, but the situation is unclear, and it is evident that a report is mandated. In these cases a decision to notify the Child Welfare Authorities may be seen as the end point of a complicated decision-making process with several possible outcomes, where several factors will influence which outcome is chosen. In these cases the decision-making processes of the day care institutions will not differ substantially from those experienced by child welfare professionals investigating a case, when school psychologists are assessing the need for extra services, or when mental health services have to judge whether to offer therapeutic assistance to a child. This has to do with clarifying a worry through closer observation and talks with the child, observations of the interaction between child and parents, talks with the parents, and dialogues with other professionals. The less concrete the worry is at the outset, the more uncertain the outcome. And the outcome may be that the day care institution choses to do nothing, to gather more information, to effect interventions within the auspices of the institution, to involve other services, or to notify the Child Welfare Authorites. Two things become paramount in this process. One is professional competence. At this point several of the respondents point out a need for increased competence in talking to parents and continuing to collaborate with them after the Child Welfare Authorities have been notified, increased knowledge about other cultures and increased knowledge about what signs to look for. The second is a clearly stated wish for the Child Welfare Authorities to be more open and visible. This signifies that day care institutions should be met with respect, on an equal footing, by the Child Welfare Authorities. This wish was apparent in many different ways. First, the respondents asked for better information from the authorities after a notification has been received, or better information when the day care institution has taken in a child as a preventive child welfare service. Confidentiality regulations should not exclude this. Second, the respondentswantbetterpossibilities todiscuss casesanonymously with the Child Welfare Authorities, and they appreciate this possibility greatly when it exists. Such discussions may actually be a contributing factor when a decision is made not to notify the Child Welfare Authorities after all. Third the respondents want more meeting places, for instance regular meetings where the day care instution and the Child Welfare Authorities are present, or an identified child welfare professional that can be contacted when necessary. Finally the respondents would like child welfare professionals to come to the day care institutions, to attend meetings with the parents and among the staff. Since the rates of notification from the day care institutions is fairly low compared to others who notify, an often stated argument is that day care institutions notify in too few cases, thus ignoring children who need help. In our opinion it is not possible to ascertain whether this is correct. One possibility for more notifications can be present when day care institution leaders consider whether to notify the authorities but end up not doing so. One fifth of them, again more from publicly than privately owned institutions, had done so during the last year. The reasons for this varied from an assessment that the problems were not so serious after all, to an agreement between the day care institution and the Child Welfare Authorities that the problem was not sufficiently serious. And quite a few had concluded that another service was more appropriate. The results from the survey give some other indications of a possible increase in the number of notifications. We have already mentioned the differences between publicly and privately owned day care institutions. Another point is that former experiences of well-functioning collaboration can make the threshold for notification lower the next time round. Thus it is important to focus on what both parties can do to improve their collaboration. As seen in the report, the respondents had many good ideas here. Two things challenge a thought that better competence and better collaboration will almost automatically lead to more notifications, however. One has to do with the problem itself. When a case is not sufficiently clear-cut to elicit a mandated report, it is difficult to judge when a child is neglected or abused. This is evident in child welfare literature as well. It is far easier to find more or less exact diagnostic instruments in other areas like behavior problems or developmental problems. In many cases it is, thus, not possible to avoid the fairly complicated decision-making processes delineated in this report. Accuracy is probably as important as quantity. When the Child Welfare Authorities have investigated cases they are notified about in the ways they are legally obliged to, around half end up with services being provided. The Child Welfare Act presupposes that the Child Welfare Authorities themselves asesss the content of such notifications. This implies that not all notifications will result in interventions. This responsibility can not be transferred to others. So one result of a greatly increased number of notifications from day care institutions may simply be that the amount of notifications leading to interventions actually decreases. Again it is important to underline the need for systematic and appropriate routines for collaboration between day care institutions and the Child Welfare Authorities, which can serve to increase the competence of the former in assessing which children to notify the authorities about - in addisjon to cases eliciting mandated reports. | en |
