Fund for Social Change, Donors vs. the System

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by Fred Scaglione
New York Nonprofit Press

An article discussing the goals and work of the Fund for Social Change with David Tobis.

Unlike many children’s charities, the Child Welfare Fund has a very definite point of view. “The idea was that people have a right to participate in the decisions which affect their lives,” says Tobis. “When you looked at the child welfare system, parents and children didn’t have any kind of role.” Tobis believes that this lack of input from families accounts in large part for many of the child welfare system’s most dysfunctional aspects – its traditional over reliance on out of home placement, inadequate in-home supports for families and a very troubled Family Court system. The result, says Tobis, was a system which often did more damage to the children and families it intended to help.

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