We Were Once a Family, with Author Roxanna Asgarian

On this week’s podcast we discuss some updates on the Indian Child Welfare Act front, Minnesota becomes a trans youth refuge, and the blind spot in America’s knowledge of youth justice. 

Imprint alum Roxanna Asgarian joins to discuss her new book, “We Were Once a Family: A Story of Love, Death, and Child Removal in America,” which traces the lives and families of six children killed by their adoptive parents in March of 2018.

Guest Interview Details

Roxanna Asgarian is a Texas-based journalist who writes about courts and the law for The Texas Tribune. She is the author of “We Were Once a Family: A Story of Love, Death, and Child Removal in America.”

Reading Room

Indian Child Welfare Act Think Tank to Strategize Legal Protections for Tribal Sovereignty http://bit.ly/3YHTpeT With Supporters from Indian Country Looking on, Minnesota Lawmakers Vote to Protect Indigenous Families http://bit.ly/40jn7Z9 Governor Signs Law that Codifies Indian Child Welfare Act Provisions into State Statute http://bit.ly/3YWsP21 Calling for ‘Love’ not ‘Hate,’ Minnesota Governor Declares His State a Refuge for Trans Youth https://bit.ly/3L82c6M On Point, March 9: Journalist Hannah Barnes on The Inside Story of The Collapse of Tavistock’s Gender Identity Clinic https://www.npr.org/podcasts/510053/on-point We’re Building a New Path to Prioritize Kin https://bit.ly/3mriEER New Mexico Has Lost Track of Juveniles Locked Up for Life. We Found Nearly Two Dozen. http://bit.ly/3yuTurI Federal Study on Transfers of Juveniles Delayed, Again http://bit.ly/3FhI91W We Were Once a Family: A Story of Love, Death, and Child Removal in America http://bit.ly/3FkaUuV Read Roxanna Asgarian’s coverage of child welfare for The Imprint https://imprintnews.org/author/roxanna-asgarian

Confronting Racism in Child Welfare Organizations

On this week’s podcast, reporter Julie Reynolds Martinez drops in to discuss a two-part series published by The Imprint and Voices of Monterey Bay about Corey Glassman, who was convicted as a teen for the brutal killing of a classmate. Glassman’s path through the incarceration system to recent parole epitomizes the changing tides in public attitude and policy about horrific crimes committed by youth.

Guest Interview Details

Beverly Jones, child operating officer for Lutheran Child and Family Services, joins us to talk about her organization’s efforts to identify massive racial disparities in the outcomes of the kids it serves, and what Lutheran did to change that trajectory.

Reading Room

The Corey Glassman Story Part I: Redemption Delayed https://bit.ly/3yrikrf Part II: Earning Freedom https://bit.ly/2SAhEzb

Post-Adoption America with April Dinwoodie

On this week’s podcast we discuss the tragic deaths of Ma’khia Bryant and Aviva Okeson-Haberman, the system clawing back social security from youth in foster care, and new research on termination of parental rights.

Guest Interview Details

April Dinwoodie joins us to discuss what we’ve learned (and what we haven’t) when it comes to supporting adoptions and guardianships in America, and what she thinks of the recent calls to repeal or revisit federal adoption legislation. 

Reading Room

‘We Should Not Be Here Today’: Ma’Khia Bryant, 16, Mourned, Celebrated at Her Funeral https://bit.ly/2QDY70u Remembering KCUR Reporter Aviva Okeson-Haberman https://n.pr/3h1Xzwd Foster Care Agencies Take Thousands of Dollars Owed To Kids Most Children Have No Idea https://bit.ly/3vHyjPX Coming Soon to Congress: Discussion on Child Support Clawback https://bit.ly/3oJjvgH New Study Confirms High Prevalence of Investigations, Loss of Parental Rights https://bit.ly/32B1GXl Five Early-Career Researchers Selected for the William T. Grant Scholars Class of 2026 https://bit.ly/338y9Vo North Carolina D.A. Erases Criminal Records for Former Juvenile Offenders https://bit.ly/3dRhBY5 Former Foster Youth’s Bill Signed: At Every Washington State School, a Foster Care Coordinator https://bit.ly/3vyBFEE Profiles in Permanency https://bit.ly/3xRkgJs

“That There Isn’t a System At All”… Dorothy Roberts on Abolition in Child Welfare

On this week’s podcast, we discuss Washington’s limitations on life without parole, “raising the floor” on juvenile arrests, rules of the road for foster youth COVID relief and prioritizing foster parents for vaccines.

Guest Interview Details

Dorothy Roberts, director of the University of Pennsylvania’s Program on Race, Science & Society, wrote Shattered Bonds: The Color of Child Welfare two decades ago. At the time, she proposed abolishing the field as we know it, to be replaced by an entirely new system. Today, she now longer believes that a system can work at all in a way that ensures justice for poor or Black families in America. She joins us to talk about the abolition movement in child welfare and the “non-reformist reforms” that she thinks can move the country in that direction.

Reading Room

Washington Supreme Court Raises Age of Sentencing Limits for Teenagers https://bit.ly/2NmSAJR Boy Picks Tulip, Gets Arrested: A Tale As Old As Time https://bit.ly/30XvYmr Federal Guidance on Foster Youth Pandemic Relief: A Breakdown https://bit.ly/3lj19lL California Foster Parents Win Vaccine Eligibility, As Fight Continues in New York https://bit.ly/3tsMiaV Abolishing Policing Also Means Abolishing Family Regulation http://bit.ly/37Y8aDQ Rising Voices For ‘Family Power’ Seek to Abolish The Child Welfare System http://bit.ly/3okyyNU

Big Questions for Child Welfare: Racial Bias and Caseworker Training

Over the next few weeks, we will be releasing  bonus episodes on Thursdays that will be conversations between The Imprint’s publisher Daniel Heimpel and Molly Tierney, the child welfare lead at Accenture and former director of Baltimore’s child welfare system.  

On today’s episode they discuss racial biases and the child welfare workforce with Karen Baynes-Dunning, acting president of the Southern Poverty Law Center and former juvenile court judge.  The three explore interesting lessons on this issue learned from testing of a virtual caseworker training platform. 

Guest Interview Details

Daniel Heimpel is the founder of Fostering Media Connections and the publisher of The Imprint. Molly Tierney is the child welfare lead for Accenture, and the former child welfare director for the City of Baltimore. Karen Bayens-Dunning is a former juvenile court judge and the acting president of the Southern Poverty Law Center.

The Abolitionists

On this week’s podcast we look at a few interesting ballot initiatives that voters will decide on tomorrow, the plan to rewrite juvenile justice in Los Angeles, and how child support is used by states to offset the cost of welfare and foster care. 

Guest Interview Details

Alan Dettlaff and Kristen Weber, co-founders of the upEND Movement, join us to talk about how the campaign came together and what they mean by seeking the abolition of the modern child welfare system.

Anti-Racism and Child Welfare

We discuss the issue of credit for schoolwork done in juvenile justice facilities, plans for a universal suicide screening for foster youth and expansion of a homelessness prevention plan for young adults aging out of care.

Guest Interview Details

Sharon McDaniel, founder of A Second Chance, Inc. and president of the group Black Administrators in Child Welfare, joins us to discuss child welfare in the time of coronavirus and what it means for a system to be “anti-racist.”