Child Abuse Training for Judicial and Court Personnel

Grants to USA organizations to improve the justice system's response to child neglect, abuse, exploitation, and trafficking. Applicants are advised to create or verify the required registrations well in advance of the deadline date. This program will support the development of training and technical assistance to improve the judicial system's handling of child abuse, neglect, and related cases.

Overview:

Courts and child welfare agencies face significant challenges in managing complex child abuse, neglect, and related cases and heavy caseloads. In addition, they are required to comply with federal child welfare reform laws and initiatives to achieve safe, permanent placements for abused and neglected children. Through this program, OJJDP seeks to provide judicial, legal, and social service professionals with training and technical assistance to enhance their understanding of child abuse issues, including the commercial sexual exploitation and sex trafficking of minors; reasonable efforts to prevent placement in foster care and reunify families after foster care placement; and coordinate information and services across systems.

Program-Specific Information:

Studies indicate that abused and neglected children are at significantly greater risk for academic failure, chronic delinquency, adult criminal behavior, antisocial personality disorder, and violent crime. In addition, as a child's length of time in out-of-home placement increases, the probability of negative outcomes also increases.

Studies also indicate that child abuse cases tend to involve domestic violence in the home and there is a greater likelihood that children in the child welfare system will enter the juvenile justice system in the future.4 Families involved in child abuse cases are often simultaneously involved in other cases in the courts (domestic violence, delinquency, high-conflict divorce, etc.). Building a broadly competent court system capable of coordinating service delivery to these multisystem-involved families is critical.

This program will develop training and technical assistance to improve the judicial system's handling of child abuse, neglect, and related cases. The applicant will select targeted courts that will serve as demonstration sites to receive the technical assistance and training. The successful applicant will design a project consistent with the OJJDP priority for a coordinated court process that minimizes trauma and promotes successful outcomes for children in contact with the court system.

Training and technical assistance will assist judicial and court personnel in implementing programs and strategies that have:
-Procedures for determining whether child service agencies have made reasonable efforts to prevent placement of children in foster care.
-Procedures for determining whether child service agencies have, after placement of children in foster care, made reasonable efforts to reunite the family.
-Procedures for coordinating information and services among health professionals, social workers, law enforcement professionals, prosecutors, defense attorneys, and juvenile and family court personnel.

OJJDP will require the successful applicant to coordinate their work with other OJJDP training and technical assistance grantees serving abused and neglected children, including victims of commercial sexual exploitation and sex trafficking of minors and adolescents.

Goals, Objectives, and Deliverables:

Under this solicitation, applicants should design a targeted, multi-tiered approach to training and technical assistance that coordinates local, state, and national initiatives to facilitate systems reform and improve outcomes for children. The successful applicant will implement this training and technical assistance model in several demonstration sites across the nation. The model should support implementation of best practices, enhance collaboration, and generate improved outcomes in participating jurisdictions. Applicants should also plan to disseminate best practices, innovation, and lessons learned from this project at the national level.

The specific goals of the model developed under this program are as follows:
-Improve the judicial system's handling of child abuse, neglect, and related cases (including cases of children who are victims of commercial sexual exploitation and sex trafficking, being mindful that sexual exploitation and sex trafficking constitute child abuse).
-Improve coordination of cases involving child abuse and neglect, domestic violence, and high-conflict divorce cases.
-Develop model procedures for coordinating information and services for serving families involved in court-related child abuse and neglect cases.
-Develop training and technical assistance that supports a model of coordinated case management by the courts that is informed by health professionals, social workers, law enforcement professionals, prosecutors, defense attorneys, juvenile and family court personnel, and families.
-Implement evidence-based practices to improve the courts' handling of child abuse, neglect, and related cases.
-Develop and deliver training and technical assistance to judicial personnel and attorneys in juvenile and family courts.
-Develop and guide administrative improvements in juvenile and family courts.
-Help court professionals (including judges, prosecutors, defenders, law enforcement, social workers, probation officers, etc.) work collaboratively.
-Encourage and assist collaborative efforts among dependency and delinquency court systems to better protect and serve victims of child sexual exploitation and domestic child sex trafficking.

Evidence-Based Programs or Practices:

OJP strongly emphasizes the use of data and evidence in policymaking and program development in criminal justice, juvenile justice, and crime victim services.

OJP is committed to:
-Improving the quantity and quality of evidence OJP generates.
-Integrating evidence into program, practice, and policy decisions within OJP and the field.
-Improving the translation of evidence into practice.

OJP considers programs and practices to be evidence-based when their effectiveness has been demonstrated by causal evidence, generally obtained through one or more outcome evaluations. Causal evidence documents a relationship between an activity or intervention (including technology) and its intended outcome, including measuring the direction and size of a change, and the extent to which a change may be attributed to the activity or intervention. Causal evidence depends on the use of scientific methods to rule out, to the extent possible, alternative explanations for the documented change. The strength of causal evidence, based on the factors described above, will influence the degree to which OJP considers a program or practice to be evidence-based.

The OJP CrimeSolutions.gov website and the OJJDP Model Programs Guide website are two resources that applicants may use to find information about evidence-based programs in criminal justice, juvenile justice, and crime victim services.

Information Regarding Potential Evaluation of Programs and Activities:

The Department of Justice has prioritized the use of evidence-based programming and deems it critical to continue to build and expand the evidence informing criminal and juvenile justice programs to reach the highest level of rigor possible. Therefore, applicants should note that the Office of Justice Programs may conduct or support an evaluation of the programs and activities funded under this solicitation. Recipients and sub-recipients will be expected to cooperate with program-related assessments or evaluation efforts, including through the collection and provision of information or data requested by OJP (or its designee) for the assessment or evaluation of any activities and/or outcomes of those activities funded under this solicitation. The information or data requested may be in addition to any other financial or performance data already required under this program.

OJJDP training and technical assistance awardee standards. OJJDP has developed the Core Performance Standards for Training, Technical Assistance, and Evaluation to promote among providers the consistency and quality of OJJDP-sponsored training and technical assistance and to advance common expectations of performance excellence. The standards present minimum expectations that providers must meet for effective practice in the planning, coordination, delivery, and evaluation of training. Award recipients must coordinate with OJJDP and OJJDP’s National Training and Technical Assistance Center (NTTAC) in the assessment and delivery of services to ensure the effective use of OJJDP grant funding.

Requirements related to coordination of activities will include, but are not limited to:

-Coordination with OJJDP NTTAC. OJJDP requires all training and technical assistance projects to coordinate their activities with OJJDP NTTAC by complying with all OJJDP/NTTAC protocols to ensure coordinated delivery of services among providers and the effective use of OJJDP grant funding. OJJDP reserves the right to modify these protocols at any time with reasonable notice to the grantee prior to project completion.

-OJJDP-funded webinars. The award recipient must comply with OJJDP’s Webinar Guidelines, as described in the core performance standards. Minimally, OJJDP training and technical assistance providers will submit information to OJJDP NTTAC in advance of all events for the online calendar, use the approved OJJDP presentation template, and record events and provide the final files which are compliant with Section 508 of the Workforce Rehabilitation Act to OJJDP or OJJDP’s representative.

-Training information sharing. OJP will collect information from its program offices on OJP- funded training and technical assistance events. Award recipients must use OJJDP’s standard electronic training request form, submit information to NTTAC on all training events (e.g., name of requestor, description of request, dates of event) 30 days in advance of the event date, and report additional data, as OJJDP requires.