Children and Youth Services Review: 'Rethinking the role of early care and education in foster care'.

Meloy, Mary Elizabeth ; Phillips, Deborah A.

The early care and education (ECE) and child welfare systems both aim to establish a federal role in protecting children at risk. However, the policies that guide these systems have developed along largely separate tracks. Service integration for foster children has recently improved following federal action to integrate child welfare services with intervention services for children with special needs, as well as with local education and Medicaid agencies. However, integration with ECE has lagged behind despite the potential of such efforts to help child welfare agencies fulfill their mandate to ensure children's safety, permanency and wellbeing. This article argues that efficient service integration across the ECE and child welfare systems has the potential to reduce costs in the short term by streamlining service provision and in the long term by promoting healthy child development. A framework is provided for understanding the potential roles that ECE can play within the foster care system that can, in turn, guide a systematic, policy-focused research agenda. The article starts with a discussion of federal policy barriers to ECE and child welfare service integration. It goes on to provide a framework for understanding the potential roles of ECE within the context of foster care, and finally proposes a research agenda to inform the integration of ECE and child welfare services for foster children.

34:5, May 2012, pp 882-90