Collaborative or Adversarial?
Angela and Jim discuss the adversarial nature of the dependency system, and how to find a balance between a collaborative and adversarial approach to representing children.
Three Powerful Practices
Children’s attorneys can’t do it all, but in our experience, doing certain things consistently in each case can improve representation and outcomes. We call it practicing with fidelity.
For our 50th Episode we wanted to give some concrete tips to our listeners. Listen to this episode to learn three actionable strategies that make a difference when repeated consistently.
Family Court and the Fourth Amendment, with Anna Arons
This week, we talk with Anna Arons. Anna is the Impact Project Director at the New York University Defense Clinic and formerly the acting assistant professor of lawyering at the New York University School of Law. She’s also an assistant professor of law at the Saint John’s University School of Law.
In this episode, Anna discusses her law review article, The Empty Promise of the Fourth Amendment in the Family Regulation System. In her article, she explains how the child welfare system unfairly targets and polices poor and minority families and denies them the constitutional protections they are promised under the Fourth Amendment.
Motion to Compel
John and Angela discuss a tool that can be used to move cases forward – the motion to compel.
Preserving Family Connections, with Vivek Sankaren
Vivek Sankaren is a clinical professor of law at the University of Michigan Law School, and director of their Child Advocacy Law Clinic and the Child Welfare Appellate Clinic. He’s authored over three dozen journal and law review articles, including “The Ties That Bind Us: an Empirical, Clinical, and Constitutional Argument Against Terminating Parental Rights”. In this episode, Vivek discusses the arguments he makes in his law review article that children are best cared for and protected when they maintain an attachment and connection to their families of origin.
One Legal Problem
In this episode, John, Jim and Angela discuss the cornerstone of their practice philosophy – keeping the focus on the child’s number one legal problem.
What Medical Child Abuse Is – and Isn’t, with Maxine Eichner
This week, we talk with Maxine Eichner. Maxine is a Distinguished Professor of Law at the University of North Carolina, and she writes on legal issues surrounding families and social welfare law and policy. In this episode, Eichner explains the history of a concept called “medical child abuse” and how innocent parents of medically complex children can easily find themselves caught up in allegations of child abuse – all because some doctors don’t understand the medical issues their children face.
Reforming the Texas Foster Care System, with Andrew Brown
Welcome back to the EPPiC Broadcast! We’re kicking off season 7 with Andrew Brown, Associate Vice President of Policy at the Texas Public Policy Foundation. As an attorney, Andrew has represented children in the child welfare system, advocated for the rights of parents, and helped build families through domestic and international adoption.
Andrew breaks down some recent major wins for Texas families in the child welfare system. Texas recently passed into law five bills that help families, which will take effect very soon. These new laws guarantee that parents under investigation in child welfare cases have access to legal representation, replace anonymous child abuse reporting with confidential reporting, and more. Andrew explains these recent reforms in more detail, plus how they will affect families who find themselves involved in child welfare investigations.
How Is That Legal?: Breaking Down Systemic Racism One Law at a Time
Kee Tobar and expert guests break down examples of systemic racism in the law and policy. By the end of each episode, you’ll understand the forces behind everyday injustices that make us ask, “How in the world is that legal?” How Is That Legal is a podcast from Community Legal Services of Philadelphia and Rowhome Productions.
The Children’s Law Podcast
Welcome to the Children’s Law Podcast brought to you by True North Child Advocates. Our goal is to empower children’s lawyers to help abused and neglected children get home faster. Listen as we discuss practical tips, our unique permanency-focused practice philosophy, and topics of interest for any child welfare professional working to improve outcomes for kids.
Audio Nuggets
Audio Nuggets is the Mining For Gold cypher, where we are expressive, independent, and a bit impatient as we struggle for even a taste of justice. It is a place where paradox is visible. Where often two things can be and are true at once. The edges of society exist as protection for some, simultaneously evoking expression. Audio Nuggets is where you will find a symbiotic force, both the heaviness of minimal air to breathe, and the light of freedom and liberation. The longing for connection and community ceases because WE ARE the community. Where human consciousness is bold and alive. We rely on the impact of the crowd to maintain the flow and the energy. Together, Audio Nuggets creates a matrix of sharing, of welcoming, of rawness. Of unity, of flavor. And most importantly, of gold mining. If you are community member and would like to have your liberated voice heard, please make a connection at: Libvoice@miningforgoldcommunity.com
Resilient Voices & Beyond
The mission of the Resilient Voices & Beyond podcast is to create a platform for the voices that were once silenced to be heard and received. We aim to showcase the hard work of community partners, leaders, advocates, activists, stakeholders, state and federal government agencies, policymakers, and legislatures, while empowering a new generation of foster care alum leaders. Through our podcast, we strive to educate our listeners on reforms, advocacy, policies, prevention, foster care, adoption, kinship, CCIs, JJ, and the child welfare system, while challenging and breaking away from the stigmas and labels surrounding these topics. We aim to create a dialogue on reform and advocacy that is already happening or needs to happen, ensuring that the voices of those affected by the child welfare system are heard and valued.
Planning for Success, Not Survival
In this episode, Jim and Angela discuss using case plans to ensure the state agency is preparing your teen client for successful adulthood, rather than just meeting federal requirements for youth aging out of the child welfare system.When Your Client is a Survivor of Sex Trafficking
This interview starts with Prof. Emma Hetherington explaining why she thinks a huge barrier to effectively serving HT/CSEC populations is that stakeholders don’t fully understand what trafficking is. In this powerful podcast, Prof. Hetherington, from the Wilbanks Child Endangerment and Sexual Exploitation Clinic at University of Georgia School of Law (CEASE Clinic), reveals how children’s circumstances and behaviors need to be examined differently when exploitation and trafficking issues are involved. She discusses tips for attorneys representing HT/CSEC survivors, screening tools, the harm reduction approach, and how to build trust with youth. We hope you learn as much as we did! Here are the resources referenced in the podcast: Red Flags of CSEC and Child Trafficking, New York State Office of Children and Family Services: https://ocfs.ny.gov/programs/human-trafficking/assets/docs/red-flags-of-CSEC-and-child-trafficking.pdf Trust-Based Relational Intervention: https://child.tcu.edu/blog-tbri-ffpsa/#sthash.c5E1aPKh.dpbs For a deep dive, check out these resources: How can the child welfare system protect young people from commercial sexual exploitation?, Casey Family Programs Strategy Brief (November 2022): https://www.casey.org/media/22.07-QFF-SC-CSEC-update.pdf Child Sex Trafficking Warning Signs, Shared Hope International: http://sharedhope.org/wp-content/uploads/2019/05/General-Warning-Signs.pdf Summary of Screening Tools: https://www.acf.hhs.gov/sites/default/files/documents/opre/IAHT%20Screening%20Brief%204.22.pdf Criminalized Survivors: Today’s Abuse to Prison Pipeline for Girls (April 2023): https://genderjusticeandopportunity.georgetown.edu/wp-content/uploads/2023/04/Criminalized-Survivors_Georgetown-Gender-Justice.pdf Sexual Abuse to Prison Pipeline: The Girls’ Story (2020): https://genderjusticeandopportunity.georgetown.edu/wp-content/uploads/2020/06/The-Sexual-Abuse-To-Prison-Pipeline-The-Girls%E2%80%99-Story.pdf Harm Reduction Series Introduction, California Child Trafficking Response Unit (2018): https://www.courts.ca.gov/documents/BTB25-3E-01.pdf Harm Reduction Series Caregiver, California Child Trafficking Response Unit (2022): https://file.lacounty.gov/SDSInter/lac/1125790_CaregiverHarmReductionI-31_22.pdfFighting for Reasonable Childhood Independence, with Diane Redleaf
This week, we welcome Diane Redleaf back to the Eppic Broadcast. Diane is the author of They Took the Kids Last Night and founder of the Family Defense Center. Diane is working with Let Grow to pass legislation in Virginia and Utah that protects reasonable childhood independence, the idea that children should be able to pursue age-appropriate activities on their own without the threat of their parents being reported for child neglect. Reasonable independence laws have already been passed in Oklahoma, Texas, and Colorado, and Diane is hopeful to expand these laws to more states in the future.The Imprint Weekly
The Imprint Weekly Podcast offers listeners a regular review of news and trends in America’s child welfare and juvenile justice systems, along with other critical services for youth and families. Join Imprint Senior Editor John Kelly for a discussion of the week’s major headlines, plus interviews with leaders in the field.