The little girl came from a troubled background. The school knew this and had her meeting with the social worker weekly. For 5 months the girl and her case worker got together and talked about feelings and other things that bothered the girl. And then, the girl refused to meet the counselor. She claimed she was afraid of the counselor but everyone knew her counselor was a young vibrant woman loved by all and feared by none. The counselor worried something else was amiss. In their weekly sessions the girl talked about not wanting to visit her father. The teacher thinks the father is the one who is stopping the counseling. The counselor fears there is something going on the father does not want to come to surface.
The social worker called Child Protective Services and told them what she felt was going on. They replied there is nothing they can do about the situation as nothing has happened yet. The social worker told them she fears there are drugs in the home and the girl is not safe\=-. The CPS worker said "sorry, we can't do anything until something happens. The girl is not taking drugs so there is nothing we can do." The social worker has faxed in her findings and is planning on going to the top of CPS. She wants to protect the child.
We all want to know how an agency whose job it is to protect the child can fail to investigate a case like this. Reacting to bad situations seems to be more important than protecting.
2 comments:
As a NYC guidance counselor I can just add that the guidance counselor should or maybe she did - conduct a school home visit. This can be done with the attendance staff who usually do home visits due to attendance issues but somehow this should have been set up. If a home visit from the school is performed than it gives the counselor more information to suspect foul play.
CPS here in Fresno is the same. They will do nothing until something very bad has happened, and even then, it's often not much. I've filed many reports only to be told all is fine, yet I knew it wasn't. CPS is a huge failure.
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