Family Support Programs and Services 

Parents Supporting Parents

Parents Supporting Parents is an evidence-based model aimed at empowering parents with lived child welfare experience as mentors to parents currently within the child welfare system.  This program hires peer supports who have prior lived-experience within the child welfare system, called parent partners.  These parent partners connect with parents who are currently experiencing the CPS system and have had their children formally removed from their care and placed into out-of-home care.  The parent partner meets with the family at least weekly to provide support, connect to services, and assist them during their journey.  Referrals for this program come from the CPS case manager.   

Rock County Parents Supporting Parents Brochure

Rock County Parents Supporting Parents Brochure - Spanish 

Family Team Meetings

Family Team Meetings is a service we provide to families within the child welfare system that follows a wraparound approach to teaming cases.  Families will have a family team meeting facilitator assigned to their case that will help them identify both informal and formal supports to include in a weekly meeting to help identify the family’s goals and work towards meeting those goals.  This structure promotes family voice, access, and ownership to their case as well as increased collaboration among service providers.  Referrals for this service are received from the CPS case manager.   

Rock County Family Team Meetings Brochure

Rock County Family Team Meetings Brochure - Spanish

Family Find and Engagement

Family Find and Engagement services are offered through the family support unit by our permanency support specialist.  This worker engages with youth and families working with our system in a variety of different ways, including voluntary services, informal agreements, and both in-home and out-of-home CHIPS petitions, to help them identify and/or develop a stronger informal support network using a variety of different tools. The permanency support specialist, along with the CPS case manager and/or foster care support worker, assist in identifying families who would benefit from this service.   

Family Support Services

Family Support Services workers are in the family support unit and provide a large variety of support to families, either through a voluntary child welfare services report or through their formal CPS case, in a variety different ways.  This may include help with connecting families to community resources, making service referrals, providing supervised visitation, and assisting with transportation. Referrals for these services either come from accepted child welfare services reports through our access reporting line or internally from CPS case managers.   

For additional information and resources around Parents Supporting Parents, Family First, and Family Find, visit the following sites: 

• Wisconsin DCF - Parents Supporting Parents
• Wisconsin DCF - Family First
• Wisconsin DCF - Permanency Consultation