County Caseworker ; LG - Luzerne County Child Welfare

Employees in this class provide a full range of social and case management services to children, youth and families, and others to assist them in attaining a more satisfactory social, economic, emotional, or physical adjustment. An important aspect of this work is the employment of casework skills in obtaining essential information, counseling clients and members of their families, and helping them to utilize all available resources.

Work also involves the application of problem solving techniques, providing counseling to maximize service delivery and to achieve service plan goals, monitoring client behavior, and interacting with agencies which make up the service network. Work is performed in accordance with established regulations, policies, and procedures, but employees are expected to exercise initiative and judgment in discharging their duties. Supervision may be exercised over paraprofessional and/or clerical staff.

Work is reviewed by a professional social service or administrative supervisor through regularly scheduled individual and group conferences, and the review of records and reports.

• The Adolescent Unit provides services to adolescents and their families. Clientele are defined as abused, neglected adolescents who exhibit numerous adjustment difficulties such as parent‑child conflict, truancy and school problems, abuse of drugs and alcohol, teenage pregnancy, psychological/emotional difficulties, learning disorders and delinquency problems. Youth are served within their own homes, foster care, community based facilities and residential facilities. The Supervisor of the Adolescent Unit works closely with contracted Specialized Adolescent Assessment Unit workers.
  
  SAAU provides assessment and refers families to community‑based agencies in an effort to circumvent LCCYS involvement. When a family is in need of ongoing and/or court mandated services SAAU opens the case and an ongoing AU worker is assigned to the case.

• The Independent Living Program is an educational life skill program that is mandated by the Department of Human Services. All foster children who have been in care after their 14th birthday are provided with a thorough comprehensive life skills education program. The program is offered either individually or in groups, and enhances life skills, prior to termination from agency services. The agency contracts 2 SIL workers to provide intensive case management with the adolescents in this group.

• The Concurrent Planning Unit consists of five Caseworkers and one Social Services Aide. This unit was developed as a response to the Adoption and Safe Families Act, in an effort to ensure that children placed in foster care placement achieve a permanent plan in a timely manner.
• The Child Welfare Standards of safety, permanence, timeliness, and well‑being are woven through this unit's practice.
• Its main function, permanency planning, is achieved through the casework model. Each caseworker, along with the family, develops, monitors, and updates Family Service Plans which seek to aid the family in the return home of their children. Family visitation, court preparation, linkage to community services, family support, and ASFA related documentation comprise the duties of the Concurrent Planning Caseworker.
• As the name Concurrent Planning suggests, caseworkers in this unit consider dual plans when working with families. If necessary, the goal of termination of parental rights and adoption is explored and considered when the grounds exist.
• As always, the best interest of children is always considered in the casework model, as are the standards of timeliness, safety, well‑being, and permanence.

• The Child Protective Services (CPS) Intake Unit assesses all reports of sexual/physical abuse or neglect. Following Commonwealth of Pennsylvania Public Welfare laws, regulations, and guidelines as well as Luzerne County procedures and policies, the CPS Intake department evaluates each child and family using a comprehensive risk and safety assessment methodology and case management techniques. The unit…