Support Social Workers
Child Welfare workers courageously step into difficult situations every day.
Child Welfare Workers are on the front lines of seeking permanency and safety for vulnerable families, children, and communities. This often means they are right in the middle of the chaos and heartache of broken lives. Their work is demanding, stressful, and they are often under-resourced and over-burdened.
According to the Annie E. Casey Foundation, annual turnover rates below 10–12 percent are considered optimal or healthy. For the past 15 years, child welfare turnover rates have been estimated at 20–40 percent.
Did you know that high turnover rates have a direct negative impact on youth in foster care?
The chance of achieving permanency decreased from 75% to 12.5% after foster care youth received just one case worker change.
(JOEY GARDNER, WALDON UNIVERSITY)
What if individuals from local churches began to address this challenge one Social Worker at a time?
How? By the simple act of seeing and encouragement!
Virginia SocialStars
Project Belong will connect church members/families/a small group to a Child Welfare social worker to provide simple monthly words of encouragement, gestures of support, and recognition as they work on behalf of vulnerable children in our region. Social Workers are busy, so these forms of encouragement need to look like thoughtful emails, letters, flowers from your yard, a candy bar, or a $5 coffee card. Your role is to simply remind them they are seen, doing a good job, and they are important.
STEP ONE
Join with the Project Belong Network.
Your church aligns with the Movement of Churches across Virginia to step into this important work of caring for vulnerable children. Project Belong is your church's bridge to the agency workers. We work with the Agencies to make this opportunity available to their Social Workers. If they express interest, we gather basic info to understand their preferences.
STEP TWO
Be matched to a Social Worker.
You sign up and Project Belong will match you with a Social Worker from September through June. Don't worry, we will provide training for you to help you better understand the work and know what to do (and not do).
STEP THREE
Start encouraging!
Set a reminder or two in your calendar each month to reach out and be an encourager. Why not also commit to praying for them each Saturday and Sunday? Project Belong will check in on you to offer help and answer any questions you may have. We are praying for several churches to join together to host a lunch for Social Workers in March, Social Worker Appreciation Month. Project Belong will be working with churches to facilitate hosting that event. That will be a time for the "Social Star" to have a meal with their "Star Encourager."
*Thank you to our sister organization in North Carolina, Congregations for Kids (CfK), for sharing the idea and structure of this program with us.
Interested in your church becoming more involved in these acts of radical hospitality? Or are you a social worker looking for support?
Contact us to get started today!