Family Group Decision Making Program

Working Together

The Children’s Aid Society offers an alternative dispute resolution program called "Family Group Decision Making" that encourages collaboration between child welfare workers and the family group. It is a culturally sensitive decision making process that brings together the family group to develop a plan that meets the needs for the child’s safety and well-being as well as the family’s as a whole. It aims to better enable family groups to have a voice in developing and implementing plans that ensure the emotional and physical safety and well-being of children through increasing the creative use, integration and mobilization of formal and informal resources.

 
Family Group Conferencing Principles Include:

• Every child has the right to be raised in an environment of safety and well-being
• The safety and well-being of the child can be assured through family participation in planning and decision making
• Families, being the experts on themselves, are central to all planning and decision making
• Families have under-used strengths and resources to solve problems for their children
• The FGC Coordinator stays in an independent role, distinct and not aligned with the family group or service providers.

Expected Outcomes and Benefits

• Shifts in relationships and improved connections; within the family group; between family members and service providers; between service providers
• Increased follow through on plans and/or involvement in changing plans
• More children returned to or remaining in care of the kinship system
• More effective and tailored use of resources within the family group and formal community resources
• Fewer family secrets
• Increased safety for all children and adults in the family
• Responsive to the family group’s unique culture