KAREN FOLEY-SCHAIN, Executive
Director
Established -
1997
Statutory
authority - Public Act 17a-50
Central office
-
Number of
employees - 18
Recurring
operating expenses - 16,000,000
Organizational
structure - A
16-member interdisciplinary board known as the Children's Trust Fund Council
governs the Children's Trust Fund. The council includes legislatively appointed
individuals from the business community, the child abuse field, parents and a
pediatrician as well as the Commissioners from the Departments of Children and
Families, Public Health, Social Services and Education.
The mission of the Children’s Trust Fund is to prevent child abuse and neglect and ensure the positive growth and development of children. The Trust Fund supports local efforts that help families and communities to be responsive to children.
Public Act 17a-50
established the Children’s Trust Fund to fund
programs aimed at preventing child abuse and neglect and that provide resources
for families. These programs reach families who are not involved in the
DCF system.
The mission of the
Children's Trust Fund had led the agency to finding the most effective means of
strengthening families, funding a broad range of organizations to implement
these programs, conducting research to assess their effectiveness and
developing strategies for improving these efforts.
The Trust Fund has found that well-planned community-based programs play an essential role in preventing child abuse and neglect. The Children's Trust Fund programs engage families and others at risk for child abuse or neglect before a crisis occurs. The programs bolster the chances that children will experience a safe and healthy home, have a positive relationship with their parents, and a stable family life - leading to success in school and healthy development through maturity.
The Trust Fund supports a
strong evaluation component for its programs. Using the data from ongoing
evaluations of programs, the Trust Fund assesses their performance through the Results Based Accountability process.
Most of the families served by Trust Fund
programs are poor and face many challenges. Their children are at great risk
for a host of developmental problems and a life-time of poverty. Research shows that the Trust Fund programs are improving home
environments, decreasing child abuse and neglect, and increasing the odds that children from high-risk families will enter
kindergarten ready to learn.
The Trust Fund programs are
assisting families in accessing health care, completing
high school, becoming employed, obtaining government benefits, establishing non-conflicted
households, and becoming better parents. The Trust Fund program
participants have healthier parenting attitudes and experience less parenting
stress. In addition, the identification of children with developmental or
behavioral risks doubled following the training provided to pediatric providers
by Trust Fund staff.