Family reunification is not always possible for children who have been removed from the care of their biological parents because of abuse or neglect. Concurrent planning puts into place a secondary plan for a permanent home should family reunification prove to be impossible. Working in four diverse communities around the country in an innovative…

The Parent Participation Task Force appointed in December 1967 by the administrators of the Office of Education, Public Health Services, and the Social and Rehabilitation Service to study parent participation and suggest policy recommendations, has recommended that the Department of Health, Education, and Welfare sponsor and promote increased…

Recounts author's life as wife of an abusive alcoholic and mother of three preschool children. Describes how, through exposure to Head Start, the author provided her children with a preschool education, gained personal self-esteem, educated herself, left the abusive relationship, and ultimately returned to Head Start as a teacher. (SD)

A study investigated why some of the low-income single caregivers of 104 children (ages 7-40 months) with disabilities were more involved in early intervention services than others. Difficulties in family functioning and lower levels of knowledge about child development were directly related to caregiver involvement. (Contains references.)…

This book presents 21 case studies of young children with disabilities in a variety of family situations and settings, for early interventionists to study in planning and applying recommended practices. Section I, "Defining and Delivering Quality Services in Early Intervention," provides two introductory chapters: "The Search for Quality…

Interviews with 12 principals of K-12 schools in rural Saskatchewan examined practices enacted in 1992-93 to lessen the effects of the farm economic crisis on students. A seven-section literature review describes the financial, personal, family, and community components of the farm crisis in Canada and the United States and provides an overview of…

This speech reports on data collected by the Early Intervention Collaborative Study (EICS), which is a longitudinal study following the development of 190 young children with disabilities (and their families) who entered 29 publicly funded early intervention programs in Massachusetts and New Hampshire in the period from 1985 to 1987. The…

This paper profiles nine model programs for supporting families who care for a child with a severe illness or one or more disabilities and discusses current trends as they emerged from interviews with key persons in the field. Core components examined include self-help, advocacy, parent education, respite care, family-centered case management, and…

On a budget of $28,000, Child Protection, Inc. has a paid staff of an executive director, 4 foster grandparents, and 3 VISTA volunteers. But with the help of 157 volunteer servide providers, the organization is able to deliver 828 units of service monthly to rural Western Kentucky. The success of the volunteer program is based on recruiting from…

This study examined barriers to utilizing services for children, birth to age 3, through in-depth individual and group interviews with 70 parents and direct service personnel of provider agencies in seven Washington counties. Part 1 of this report offers examples and discussion of the difficulties parents have accessing services and how localities…