April 23, 2024 – 9:00 a.m. – 1:00 p.m.
Delta Hotel (Minneapolis)
Breakfast will be provided. Free CEUs available.
The Center for Advanced Studies in Child Welfare is pleased to announce our 24th Annual Spring Child Welfare Conference. On Tuesday, April 23, we will host a half-day conference on COVID-19’s impact on families, the workforce, and the delivery of child welfare services.
Participants will hear from a variety of speakers, as well as each other, as we explore lessons learned related to crisis response, child maltreatment, virtual engagement, family preservation, emerging promising practices and more. We hope to better understand how this collective experience over the past few years has both shaped and informed the current landscape of child welfare work. The conference will be in-person, with an opportunity for groups to stream live.
Conference Agenda
| Time | Topic |
|---|---|
| 8:30-9:00 | Registration, Breakfast and Networking |
| 9:00-9:15 | Welcome |
| 9:15-9:30 | Morning Reflections |
| 9:30-10:30 | A Workforce in Transition: We're Better Together (Amelia Franck Meyer) |
| 10:30-10:45 | Break |
| 10:45-12:00 | Panel Presentation - Lessons Learned from Minnesota Service Providers |
| 12:00-12:45 | Child Protection and the COVID Pandemic: The Forgotten Frontline Responders (Stacy Hennen) |
| 12:45-1:00 | Closing and Evaluation |
Conference Panelists
The panel consists of service delivery providers throughout Minnesota, including leaders from a youth-serving organization, residential family treatment center, county court, and foster care licensing agency. We will discuss the nature of their work as it relates to child welfare and the impact of COVID-19 on clients and the workforce.
Conference Speakers
Amelia Franck Meyer
Dr. Amelia Franck Meyer, LISW is the Founder and CEO of the national nonprofit, Alia. Amelia and Team Alia are leading a nationally co-designed movement to keep children safe with, not from, their families. Amelia and Team Alia believe that families are the solution (not the problem). Alia calls this new way of work an “UnSystem.” Team Alia believes that a key part of transformation is supporting families to safely raise their children. Working with innovative leaders, Amelia and Team Alia use best practices, evidence, and human centered design principles to operationalize concepts that produce rapid results and positive outcomes for youth and families. At Alia, Amelia also works to convene changemakers and partners to advance the tools and knowledge base in the field of child welfare. Amelia has co-authored and led the publication of a Social Return on Investment Study: The Unseen Costs of Foster Care; a Research Brief: Evidence Base for Avoiding Family Separation in Child Welfare Practice; Creating a Permanence Driven Organization: A Guidebook for Change in Child Welfare; and multiple reports on learnings and outcomes from the 14-county Alia UnSystem Innovation Cohort.
Stacy Hennen
Stacy Hennen is the Director of Western Prairie Human Services, a joint powers entity formed January 1, 2022, covering Grant and Pope County and Traverse County Social Services through a contract. Stacy has been a human services director for 15 years, starting in Grant County and adding Pope County in 2019 and Traverse County in 2021. Prior to being a human services director, Stacy worked in child protection and supervision of a children’s residential facility for 14 years. Stacy served in numerous leadership roles in the past 15 years. She was appointed by the Governor to the Governor’s Child Protection task force and served on it for its entirety. She was also appointed by the Governor to the Human Services Performance Management Council and served on it since its inception. Stacy was President of the Minnesota Association of County Social Services Administrators (MACSSA) in 2015 and served in many other leadership roles within MACSSA including Chair of their Children’s Committee and the first Vice President of MACSSA. She currently is the Legislative Lead for MACSSA. Stacy received MACSSA’s Human Services Award in 2016. Stacy worked on many endeavors in her time as a director, including targeted case management redesign, vulnerable children and adults formula changes, and many child welfare projects. Stacy worked through her counties and teams to create Western Prairie Human Services and worked with her colleagues within her region to bring things like Collaborative Safety and Community Intensive Bridging Services (CIBS) to her counties and communities. Stacy testified in front of the Minnesota Legislature on a variety of children’s and general human services issues. She is married with two adult daughters.
