“Family Empowerment and Future Development: An All-Inclusive Handbook for Case Book Workers Working with Children and Youth”


All-Inclusive Guide to Social Work with Families and Child Social Services: Everything You Should Know

Working with children is one of the most common occupations that social workers in schools, families, and/or children’s homes do.

You’ve come to the correct place if you’re interested in learning how child social work benefits children and their families or how to work as a child social worker. We’ll go over a number of issues pertaining to social work with children in this summary of family and child welfare social work.

The Bureau of Labor Statistics projects that 362,600 positions for child, family, and school social workers will become available by 2026. In comparison, it is anticipated that there will only be 211,900 employed healthcare social workers, the second greatest category. This implies that employment involving children and young adults will always be in great demand.The majority of social workers employed in the United States fall under the category of child, family, and school social workers out of all the other groups.

In a time of crisis, a child’s social worker has the potential to be one of the most influential individuals in their life. For young children, preteens, teens, and their families, social services child care and other child care services are therefore essential to their quality of life.

Pavel Danilyuk

Employed in Social Services Child Safety

In this area of social work, a child welfare professional assists children and families in times of need by offering guidance, support, and connections to useful services.


Contact the Case Book Work Hub Team if you have any questions about this end-to-end child welfare social workers guide. Also, if you are a very experienced child family and school social worker, and would like to provide feedback that can help other social workers, do reach out to us.


Child Social Services: What Are They? What Exactly Goes Into These Services?

There are two accepted interpretations of what “child social services” are. In the United States, Child Protective Services, an organization within the U.S. Department of Social Services (DSS), is frequently referred to by another name, “child social services.”

Child Protective Services can investigate reports of child abuse and neglect with the assistance of a child protection social worker. The primary objective of the DSS social services child protection social worker is to ensure the child’s safety, and they will make every effort to keep them in their homes.

The various forms of support that governments, educational institutions, and nonprofit organizations offer to children and their families can also be referred to as child social services.

Free or reduced-price school lunches are among the most popular social services that most people are aware of when it comes to child care help. Additional social care services that are provided to families and children consist of:

  • Proving a safe place for children to stay
  • Parenting skills classes
  • Financial assistance
  • Housing assistance
  • Counseling and therapy
  • Substance abuse rehabilitation
  • Tutoring and mentoring
  • Assistance for disabled children
  • Food and nutrition

Do you have any questions or feedback about this article on what social work children rely on? If so, click here to contact the Case Book Work Hub Team.


Social Workers in Child Welfare: What Are They? What Actually Happens to Them?

A social worker with a degree in child and family therapy specializes in working with children to improve their quality of life through child social services.

A social worker specializing in children works with kids and their families. They carry out a variety of duties, including protecting the welfare and safety of children and offering support in behavioral health therapy.

Assisting parents with basic needs so they can take care of their children is another aspect of social work with children. Food, clothes, and even parenting classes could fall under this category.

When a kid’s life or well-being is in jeopardy, child welfare workers are frequently called in to help. They support children’s rights and assist in finding them safe homes.

Schools employ a different kind of social worker who works with children. They frequently take on the role of counselors and are able to identify emotional issues and offer remedies.


How Can Someone Get Into Children’s Social Work? What You Must Understand

The following requirements must be met if you’re interested in working with children and want to become a child social worker.  

To become a child social worker, you must first have a bachelor’s degree. Although a four-year degree in a related discipline, like psychology, may be accepted for some social services child care employment, a Bachelor of Social Work (BSW) degree is preferred.

You’ll need further education if you wish to work as a children’s social worker with more responsibility than entry-level duties.

Gaining a Master of Social Work (MSW) degree will make you qualified for a lot more roles working with families and children in social work. This entails tasks including conducting assessments and one-on-one counseling as well as taking on a more supervisory position after gaining sufficient expertise.

Which Certifications Are Available to Social Workers in Child Welfare?

If you’ve been looking for information on how to work as a children’s social worker and would like to advance in this sector, you might consider getting certified.

Obtaining a certificate in child and family social work will improve your reputation as a social worker. A certification may also expand your options for social work with families and children, including the ability to function as a clinical therapist.

  • LCSW: You can apply for a general license with your state as a Licensed Clinical Social Worker. This allows you to diagnose and carry out treatment plans for mental and emotional issues.
  • C-SSWS: The National Association of Social Workers (NASW) offers a credential as a Certified School Social Work Specialist. If you’re interested in social work with kids in schools, this would be a certification to look into.
  • C-CYFSW: This is another NASW credential and is for youth, family, and child welfare social work. The Certified Children, Youth, and Family Social Worker credential only requires a bachelor’s degree in social work.
  • C-ACYFSW: The Certified Advanced Children, Youth, and Family Social Worker certification from NASW is one level higher than the C-CYFSW and it requires a master’s degree in social work.

Would you like to learn more about how to become a children’s social worker? Check out our article “Best Social Work Degree Programs for Social Workers.”


What Does a Child Social Worker Do? What Does This Professional Really Do?

The duties of a social worker working with children will vary according to the type of position a child welfare worker has. For example, a school social worker may be helping teachers with behavioral plans for emotionally troubled students.

A person that practices social work with youth in a runaway shelter, may be heavily involved with substance abuse referrals and jobs assistance. And a child protection social worker may be doing casework and follow-up with Foster Care families.

In all types of child social services and social work jobs working with children, social workers will act as advocates for a child. Their guiding mission is to help a child through a time of crisis and improve their situation.

Photo by Tima Miroshnichenko

How To Become a Child Social Worker

The following is a summary of some of the usual responsibilities of social workers who work with children.

Main Duties of a Child and Family Social Worker:

Social work with children will encompass some of the following duties:

  • Interview and Assess Children & Families: A child and family social worker will use a variety of family assessment tools social work agencies provide to assess the needs of a child that requires assistance. At the end of this article, we highlight a family assessment example social work template.
  • Connect Families With Resources: Once a social work family assessment example has been completed, a child and youth social worker will then match the child and family with appropriate resources and referral agencies.
  • Assist in Abuse & Neglect Investigations: A social services child protection social worker is often responsible for conducting or assisting with abuse and neglect investigations to determine whether a child needs to be removed from a home for their own safety.
  • Assist With Placements in Safe Homes: Child welfare social workers will help place children that need a place to live in a safe home. This could be a Foster Care home or through adoption.
  • Arrange Support Services: The main responsibility of social services child protection social workers and social workers in other jobs working with children is to arrange support services. This would be according to the needs identified in the social work family assessment report example. These child social services can be child care, prenatal care, substance abuse treatment, parenting classes, psychiatric help, and other types of support.
  • Maintain Case History & Reporting: All types of social work for children, youth, and family clients involve keeping a case history and reporting on all interactions.
  • Counseling: Social work with families and children involves counseling to help someone overcome a particular issue. This could be counseling for teenage pregnancy, truancy, misbehavior, etc.
  • Collaboration & Serve as a Liaison: When doing social work with kids, social workers will often act as a liaison between parents, teachers, and other school personnel and collaborate a child’s care plan with all parties.
  • Advocate for Children: Social care services for children include acting as an advocate for a child’s health and wellbeing, sometimes when there is no one else to do so.
  • Ongoing Case Book Management Hub & Follow-up: In many settings, such as child social services with DSS and jobs working with children in schools, a child social worker will continue to follow up to ensure a child is on the right path or continues to be in a safe environment.

In What Ways Do Social Workers Assist Families? What You Must Understand

The ultimate goal of a social worker working with children and families is to try and maintain family unity. As a result, they will offer struggling families a wide range of aid.

There are four primary ways that social workers assist families when responding to the question, “How do they help families?”

  • Providing basic needs and referrals to agencies (food, financial help, transportation, etc.)
  • Helping with a child’s behavioral or educational needs through counseling or as part of a care team
  • Offering support and advocacy to assist the family and their child with understanding government agencies and programs
  • Providing guidance through assessment, strategy and goal planning, and follow-up to ensure goal achievement is on track

What offers families the services of a child social worker? In the end, they support them in overcoming adversity and, if at all feasible, maintain them together.


Contact the Case Book Work Hub Team if you would like more information about how social workers help families. The next section covers the different types of social workers that work with family and children.


What Kinds of Social Workers Work with Schools, Families, and Children?

As we’ve discussed in the sections above, social work with teenagers, families, and children can take many various forms.

Take a look at this section to see the various career paths that social work and children’s advocacy can lead to if you’re looking for information on how to become a children’s social worker.

Child Social Services / Foster Care Social Worker

Family and child welfare social work often means working with the government to provide child social services. This involves working with Foster Care system families to support them and continually assess effectiveness.

Child Protection Social Worker

Another type of government position is as a child protection social worker. They typically are dealing with crisis situations and will conduct investigations to see if a child needs to be taken from a home and facilitate that transition to safety.

Child Social Services Family Preservation Social Worker

There is a special type of child welfare social worker that supports in-crisis families where a child’s safety is not in immediate danger. These professionals do social work with families to keep them together.

School Social Worker

A child, family, and school social worker will work in an educational environment to counsel and assist kids in need and may be asked to visit children that are studying remotely to check up on them.

At-Risk Youth Social Worker

Social work with youth is a specialty that will involve helping at-risk teens through behavioral, physical, and emotional crises. Social work with kids in their teens may also involve working at a shelter for runaways or a teen pregnancy center.

Social Work With Children & Adoptions

Due to death, abuse, substance abuse, or neglect, some children may need to find permanent homes. A child and family social worker’s specialty field is facilitating adoptions for children in these cases.

Behavioral Counselor

A common field of social work for child wellbeing is as a behavioral counselor. You’ll often find that counselors are also child, family, and school social workers working in an educational environment.

Therapist Clinical Child Social Worker

A social worker working with children that has their LCSW certification will be qualified to act as a therapist and conduct clinical social work. These clinical child welfare social workers will often work with children that have severe mental or emotional problems.

If you have any questions about this article on becoming a children’s social worker, or the following information on family assessment social work example reports and assessments in social work and children, click here to contact the Case Book Work Hub Team.


What Constitutes a Quality Assessment in Children’s Social Work?

The evaluation is one of the most significant duties in social work with families and children. The next phases, which involve creating a care plan to address the needs that have been assessed, will be guided by the initial social work family assessment example report.

The sort of assessment being conducted will determine the format of the sample social work report for a family assessment. Government agency child welfare social workers, for instance, may be doing an evaluation to determine whether a child can stay in their family or whether there is a safety concern.

To identify the underlying reason of a behavioral issue that is causing a student to act out in class, a social worker who works with children in schools might need to perform a family assessment social work example for emotional disorders.

For all types of social work family assessment examples, the following factors make a “good” children’s social work assessment:

  • The purpose of the assessment is clear
  • The assessment is child-focused and includes input from the child or children involved
  • The recommended care plan is comprehensive
  • The recommended care plan is outcome-focused
  • The care plan takes a collaborative approach, involving other relevant parties and/or agencies
  • The family assessment example social work report includes details on where, when, and how the assessment interviews were conducted
  • The children’s social worker assessment includes a thoughtful analysis, not just a recitation of the facts
  • The recommended care plan has achievable goals and timeline estimates
  • The recommended care plan allows for flexibility and adjustment as needed

Studying social work with children involves reviewing examples of child and family social worker assessments to become familiar with the information typically gathered.

Tools for Child and Family Assessment Professionals in Social Work Utilize

Social professionals who work with children can use a wide variety of family assessment instruments. While some of these are unique to a school district or other organization, others will be mandated by the state or another government body.

In accordance with social work best practices, a variety of assessment instruments for social work with families will be employed extensively. These are a few of the instruments child welfare social workers use to evaluate households.

  • Needs Assessment: This is a common assessment in all kinds of social work, including in jobs working with children. It’s where a social worker identifies the initial needs (emergency, urgent, short-term, long-term) of a client so a care plan can be developed.
  • Culturagram: The culturagram assessment is used to help understand the values and cultural background of a family. It’s commonly used for refugee or immigrant families.
  • Friedman Family Assessment Model: This social work assessment is used to assess family strengths and weaknesses. It can be used in the case of teenage pregnancy to assess the potential fitness of a future home environment for a child.
  • Genogram: The genogram assessment in social work with children and families maps out a child’s family relationships and the status of how healthy those relationships are.
  • Calgary Family Assessment Model: This model is based on the importance of family in enabling the benefits provided by social work children require. It looks at three key areas of a child and family: Structural, Developmental, Functional.

Conclusion | Social Work Jobs & Child Social Services Dealing with Children

When compared to other forms of social work, social work with children, youth, and families is by far the most significant and expansive field.

Schools, hospitals, youth shelters, government agencies, and other organizations that assist children and their families greatly benefit from having child and family social workers on staff.

It is incredibly fulfilling to support kids and their families at trying times and as they work through challenging issues. The child social services that are offered are frequently essential to a child’s long-term physical and mental health.

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