system of care for rhode island's children, youth and families

CHAPTER 1: EXECUTIVE SUMMARY
Rhode Island’s organized Ideal System of Care for Children, Youth and Families is built on
the strengths of families and communities, the successes of past initiatives, and is responsive
to the challenges of the past. It is a system that is operationally feasible, financially realistic
and supported by broad consensus. This system is a strategic instrument for moving the State
closer to the four outcomes embraced by the Rhode Island Children’s Cabinet and other key
state and community leaders:
• All Children Entering School Ready To Learn
• All Youth Leaving School Ready To Lead Productive Lives
• All Children And Youth Safe In Their Homes, Neighborhoods And Schools
• All Children Living In Families That Are Self-Sufficient, yet Interdependent
The organized, ideal system is defined by the themes that follow and implemented through
the identified strategies and processes which support these themes.
THEME: FAMILY CENTERED PRACTICE – A FUNDAMENTAL SHIFT IN SERVICE DELIVERY
The Ideal System supports the role of the family as the primary caregiver for children and
recognizes that the optimum interventions for any individual child and their family are the
interventions most proximate to home with the full resources of the community made
available to that child and family (see Chapter 3 and Appendices B and D). It is critical to
note that “families” include biological parents, adoptive families, extended kinship networks,
legal guardians and temporary foster families. The broad vision is one in which a
substantially greater portion of state resources are allocated to universal and selected
prevention or early intervention services. However, the Ideal System acknowledges that
substantial portions of the state’s limited resources must be focused to meet the immediate
needs of identified priority populations.
THEME: PREVENTION AND EDUCATION
The system’s foundation is coordinated by local community members and state staff to
ensure that all neighborhoods where families live have strong prevention and educational
services and supports for the complex and changing needs of today’s children and families.
It is a system which provides families and other caregivers ready access to the resources
necessary to meet children’s developmental needs. The system has mechanisms to redirect
cost savings from reduced reliance on restrictive and expensive out-of-home placements to
community-based prevention and intervention services. This is accomplished by shifting
service delivery methods for these priority populations from a provider-driven, bed-based
methodology to a culturally competent, family centered, community-based methodology
that is school-linked, provides adequate state aid to achieve better outcomes, and integrates
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