Abstract

Services for families and children are rightfully the focus of intense scrutiny and debate, and there is a clear need to establish a knowledge of which services work well.

This volume provides a comprehensive overview of research evidence from the UK and USA on the effectiveness of selected child welfare interventions. It addresses the challenges of measuring effectiveness in child welfare and explains the policy context for child welfare service delivery. Leading international contributors summarize the evidence of effectiveness in each core area, and consider the impact on children's development, parenting capacity and the wider community. Critically, the book also draws out the implications of the evidence for policy, practice and service delivery as well as for future research.

This book is essential reading for policy makers, practitioners and commissioners of services in child welfare as well as students and researchers.

... this is a timely and important book given the continuing debate around evidence-based practice. It covers a wide range of services, including foster care, adoption, innovative approaches in schools and communities, and interventions with children who have experience abuse or neglect... This book will be a useful addition to the bookshelf for managers and social work practitioners... This is an interesting book for any practitioner or student seeking an overview of current debates about parenting young people and of initiatives undertaken by the TSA in this field.
Journal of Children's Services
Twenty-six contributions from international researchers provide and overview of selected child welfare interventions in the US and the UK, summarizing the evidence for their effectiveness and discussing the implications for their policy, practice and research. In the first section, the program context for the child and family services in each country is described. Subsequent chapters focus on specific intervention, such as home visiting, foster family care, school interventions and community programs.
Sci Tech Book News

If you are interested in learning what is known and particularly, what is still unknown about a comprehensive range of interventions to improve the lives of children in all sorts of difficulties, this is the book for you...There are consequently important lessons for both policy-makers and service providers in this book. Once again, the interventions that seem to be most effective work with children, young people, and parents. They have clear goals, are appropriately targeted and they are delivered by a well-trained and well-supported staff. There is much valuable discussion on the complexity of the problems that children and families face.

Workforce investment seems to be the route to making sure that those interventions that we know form this book and others do work, are used routinely, appropriately and with skill. We have a very large and diverse workforce in children's social care. This book illustrates both the need to learn more about what works, with whom and u under what circumstances, but it also illustrates the need to improve the frontline delivery of services now, with the best use of the knowledge we already have. This will only be achieved by skilled and confident practitioners who can learn from this book.

Children & Society
There is a clear need to establish a knowledge of which services for families and children work well. This book provides a comprehensive overview of research evidence on the effectiveness of selected child welfare interventions.
CAFCASS
This publication gives an interesting insight into international research evidence on child welfare interventions. It covers a number of areas including general interventions for children; interventions for vulnerable children and families; interventions for children who have been abused or neglected; interventions for children who have been in care, or who have been adopted; as well as innovative approaches for schools and communities. The work covers evidence from both the UK and US. This book provides reliable and informative information and would be useful reading for policy makers, practitioners and commissioners of children's services.
Child Right
This book... provides a timely contribution to the literature aimed at enhancing understanding of outcomes research in the UK and USA and the importance of developing evidence-based practice. This edited book provides comprehensive insights into the complex area of how intervention strategies impact on children and families in the two countries (UK and USA). The impressive list of contributors cover wide ranging issues concerning policy and service provision... The book is divided into six parts and manages to interweave UK and US perspectives in paired chapters, which is a real strength of the book. This style supports the reader in developing real insights into research undertaken in the two countries and facilitates a comparative analysis of wide-reaching service provision. The reader is able to engage with early childhood who has faced a range of abuse, fostering, adoption, residential care and school and community programmes. Through these areas, the authors manage to provide extensive evidence-based discussion that can be used to inform service providers, policy-makers and students...This book is a welcome edition and the contributors should be congratulated on the scope and depth they manage to achieve. Indeed, their reference list provides an excellent resource for the research community.
Journal of Early Childhood Research
This book illustrates both the need to learn more about what works, with whom and under what circumstances, but it also illustrates the need to improve the frontline delivery of services now, with the best of the knowledge we already have. This will only be achieved by skilled and confident practitioners who can learn from this book.
National Children's Bureau
I think this book succeeds in many ways. It provides solid reviews of the literature on the effectiveness of a range of child welfare interventions from the perspectives of knowledgeable U.K and U.S authors. There are chapters on some vital areas including residential treatment, foster care, home visiting, and school-based prevention programs. Several of the chapters are thought provoking, going beyond the typical literature review format to provide some real insight into the subject matter... this is a worthwhile book that deserves a place on the bookshelves of service developers, policy makers, and service researchers. It is informative and comprehensive.
APA Review of Books