{"id":31702,"date":"2019-12-18T18:12:52","date_gmt":"2019-12-18T18:12:52","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/caseyfamilyv2.wpengine.com\/safe-babies-court-teams\/"},"modified":"2026-07-20T17:15:16","modified_gmt":"2026-07-20T17:15:16","slug":"equipos-de-los-tribunales-de-bebes-seguros","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.casey.org\/es\/safe-babies-court-teams\/","title":{"rendered":"\u00bfC\u00f3mo mejora los resultados para los beb\u00e9s y ni\u00f1os peque\u00f1os el enfoque del Safe Babies Court Team\u2122?"},"content":{"rendered":"
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Summary<\/h3>\n

Local, universal supports help keep families safe and together \u2014 and reduce the need for court intervention. This brief looks at evidence of effectiveness, core components and key success factors.<\/em><\/p>\n<\/div>\n \n \n \n <\/div>\n<\/div>\n\n\n

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Infants and young children are most vulnerable to child abuse and neglect, with more than one-quarter (28.5%) of victims of maltreatment under age 3<\/span><\/a>. These same children frequently experience further trauma as a result of their family\u2019s involvement in the child welfare system, which at worst can include lengthy separations from their families and multiple placements. Research and experience have shown that separating children from their families creates lasting trauma, usually lifelong<\/span><\/a>. Community-based and universal family supports can help keep children safe and families together, and ultimately prevent the need for court involvement.<\/p>\n

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However, when court involvement is necessary, the Safe Babies Court Team\u2122 (SBCT) approach is focused on minimizing trauma and its impact on early development by improving how the courts, child welfare agencies, and related child-serving organizations work together to support young children and their families<\/b><\/span>. The SBCT approach is a systems change initiative headed by ZERO TO THREE<\/span><\/a>, a national organization working to ensure that babies and toddlers benefit from the family and community connections critical to their well-being and development. The initiative began in several sites in 2005 and has expanded to more than 80 across the country.<\/p>\n

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Each SBCT works at both the family and systems level. Family teams \u2014 composed of family members, attorneys, case planners, and service providers \u2014 come together at least once a month to identify and remove barriers to reunification, helping to expedite services (and ideally, permanency) for infants and young children. In addition, community court teams \u2014 led by judges and composed of community stakeholders \u2014 review patterns across cohorts of individual cases to address structural issues in the child welfare system that prevent families from succeeding.<\/p>\n

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Broad involvement of community systems and stakeholders, and the focus on systems change as a vehicle to better support families with young children, make this approach highly compatible with a broader, more preventive 21st<\/sup> century approach to child welfare. Policy and other systems changes resulting from SBCTs may ultimately benefit families at risk before they reach the court system. In addition, integrating the core components of the SBCT approach as standard practice for all dependency courts \u2014 rather than as a specialized approach for some \u2014 has the potential to address the needs of all families, ultimately reducing trauma and expediting permanency for all children who come into contact with the child welfare system.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n \n \n \n <\/div>\n<\/div>\n\n\n

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We\u2019re taking a public health approach with our work, helping communities build the needed supports for families so that children can remain at home safely.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

— Janie Huddleston, Director of the National Infant-Toddler Court Program, ZERO TO THREE<\/cite><\/figcaption>\n <\/div>\n\n <\/div>\n<\/figure>\n\n\n
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Evidence of effectiveness<\/h2>\n \n \n \n

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In 2014, the U.S. Children\u2019s Bureau provided a grant to ZERO TO THREE to develop the Quality Improvement Center for Research-Based Infant-Toddler Court Teams <\/span>(QIC-ITCT), which provided technical assistance and training to participating sites. Today<\/a>, the project is called the Infant-Toddler Court Program and is operated by ZERO TO THREE and partners with funding from the federal Health Resources and Services Administration. SBCTs currently operate in local communities in 27 states. SBCTs have been independently studied, most recently as part of the QIC-ITCT project. Evaluations have identified many benefits of this approach, including the following:<\/p>\n