Casey’s Prevention and Family Support unit developed the Neighborhood-Based Prevention (NBP) Initiative in partnership with local collaboratives and the Los Angeles County Department of Children and Family Services (DCSF) to help prevent child abuse and neglect and to reduce the need for out-of-home care.
In 2005, Casey joined the Norwood Healthy Start Collaborative at Norwood Street Elementary School in Service Planning Area (SPA) 6 in order to increase protective factors that can help prevent child abuse and neglect.
To address needs while building on community and family strengths, the collaborative performed an assessment of the key strengths and needs of the families and children in the SPA 6 area.
Casey is also working with the Family Support Collaborative at the South Bay Center for Counseling in SPA 8.
Please use the links below to view the executive summary of the report and the original survey questions. The full report will be posted here as well when it is available.
Project Context
The letter below is being sent to project colleagues, along with the Summary Report. It provides further context about the project.
Dear Colleague:
It is with great pleasure that we share with you the Community Assessment for the Norwood Street Elementary School neighborhood. For the past year, we have worked together with our community partners and parents at the school to document the key strengths and needs of families who have children attending the school. In addition, we have mapped the formal services that are available in the community and we are in the process of working with formal and informal community and faith based organizations to determine their capacity to serve the needs and increase the strengths of families in this area. We began this work to create a partnership in high risk communities between residents and child welfare, school, and community based organizations that would help prevent child abuse. As we move forward in our collaborative work we plan to use this Community Assessment as the baseline for our efforts in this neighborhood. Our ultimate goal is to increase the protective factors and decrease the risk factors of vulnerable families who may be at risk of entering the child welfare system.
This Community Assessment is the first step in a multiyear partnership. Our next step will be to work with residents and organizations in the neighborhood to develop an action plan that will address the top priorities residents want to see improved or strengthened. The action plan will be implemented through a neighborhood partnership that includes multiple stakeholders who have an interest in seeing all families in the Norwood community succeed and thrive. We are hopeful that you will see this community assessment process as a template for future work in high risk communities and that you will want to learn more about how you can implement this process in other communities.
To review the assessment questions and the results of the survey, please use the links below. If you would like additional information regarding our partnership please feel free to call our staff listed below.
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Casey Family Programs, Neighborhood Based Prevention Initiative—Dr. Mona Gil de Gibaja at mgibaja@casey.org
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Norwood Street Elementary School, Healthy Start Collaborative—Diana Ruiz at druiz@k12.lausd.edu
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As we move forward in our collaborative work we will keep you informed of the progress being made in strengthening families in the Norwood neighborhood and our other NBP sites.
Sincerely,
David Sanders
Casey Family Programs
Frances Goldman
Norwood Street Elementary School
Trish Ploehn
LA County Department of Children and Family Services
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Norwood Documents: