Q: What are the Regional Training Academy Coordination Project’s major activities?

A: The project pursues a variety of activities aimed at raising the standards of training for child welfare workers in California and coordinating statewide training efforts. Current activities include:

• Statewide coordination of curriculum development and standardization: CalSWEC has coordinated the development and imple-mentation of statewide common core training for line workers and supervisors, as mandated by the federal Child and Federal Services Review (CFSR). The project also works to integrate best practices and research into curricula for use across the state, and to integrate pre-service BSW/MSW education with in-service training. CalSWEC convenes strategic planning sessions for the coordinating partners and co-chairs (with CDSS) the Statewide Training and Education Committee (STEC).
  
  
• Statewide training evaluation: A national leader in the evaluation of human services training, CalSWEC has developed the Framework for Training Evaluation, a common approach to evaluation that can be used to evaluate child welfare training across the state. The project also annually sponsors the National Human Services Training Evaluation Symposium, a unique forum for training evaluators from around the country to present and discuss training evaluation issues. In 2003 CalSWEC received a Special Recognition Award from the National Staff Development and Training Association for this symposium.
  
  
• Fairness and equity in child welfare services training: The project works to focus statewide efforts on developing and implementing effective training strategies to address inequities in the child welfare system based on race, ethnicity, or region. The annual Symposium on Fairness and Equity Issues in Child Welfare Training brings together training professionals from around the state to strategize about this vital issue. CalSWEC has also co-sponsored statewide events aimed at county leadership and provides funds for its coordinating partners to work on this issue regionally.
  
  
• Emergent issues related to CFSR, CWS improvement activities, and other CDSS and CWDS initiatives: The pace of change in California’s child welfare system has accelerated rapidly with the advent of the CFSR process, the implementation of AB 636, and the continuing CWS improvement efforts. CalSWEC has been at the center of these changes, providing leadership and training assistance to move California toward a more outcomes-driven, child- and family-focused, equitable child welfare system.
  
  

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Map of California's Regional Training Academies
RTA Coordination Project fact sheet