Child welfare workers; in-house and external Economic Resource Navigators (ERNs)

• ‍ES Activity Reporting Form.

1. Economic Resource Navigator (ERN) meets with family and clearly reviews needs identified by the referring child welfare worker (CWW).

• Use the information shared by the child welfare worker explicitly. For example, say things like, "I know you already shared that you…" or "You expressed previously that…" and then ask follow-up questions, rather than ignoring information they've already provided in this process.‍

2. ERN assesses the full scope of challenges around each need and uncovers other needs that weren’t identified by the initial screening.

• Child welfare workers keep their initial screening brief to surface and flag that help is needed. It's then up to the ERN to dig deeper and ask the follow-up questions needed to understand what's really going on.‍
  
  • Severity: What's at stake, and what is the frequency or urgency?‍‍
  • Underlying Factors: If the family or young person has applied for or received support for this need before, why is there still a challenge?‍‍
  • Previous Obstacles: If their applications have been denied, why?‍
• ‍Feel out the right opportunity to screen and probe for other needs that haven't been identified. This might happen during the first conversation, but it might be easier during the second or third.

3. ERN helps family set goals and focuses on their prioritized needs.

• Let the family or young person set a couple primary goals, such as an educational milestone, resolving a legal situation, or securing new housing. Spend your initial time focused on those goals. Supporting their goals builds trust and openness to you helping them with other needs.

4. ERN helps clarify the status of existing applications, identifies what recertifications are or will be needed, and supports next steps.

5. ERN assesses what new program(s) the family is eligible for.

6. ERN helps assemble needed information and documentation for eligible applications.

7. ERN supports new applications and referrals to relevant programs and providers, plus any needed follow-up.

8. ERN uses available technical assistance as needed.

• As you support the family or young person with assessing eligibility, application status, recertification, document gathering, and referrals to other programs, make use of the training and technical assistance offered (see Training and Technical Assistance).

9. ERN reassesses all Economic Security needs at regular intervals throughout the case as it proceeds.

10. ERN updates CWW every two weeks regardless of progress and alerts them of any out-of-office periods.

• Send an update even if you haven't yet met with the family or young person, or if there's been no progress. The report should cover what is being done to meet the family's needs, what supports are being pursued or applied for, and the status of those applications, whether preparing to submit, submitted and pending, or accepted/rejected.
• This is necessary because the child welfare worker relies on your update to know the case is still active and being worked on. Silence can be misread as the family or young person having disengaged or the referral having stalled, which can trigger duplicate outreach or a loss of trust in the referral process.
• A quick "no progress yet, still attempting contact" update keeps the family accounted for and the case accurately documented.
• You can also generate a report through your internal systems and email it as an encrypted attachment to the referring child welfare worker.
• If the referring child welfare worker is in-house, they might have access to the internal systems where you have documented your work. Report or check-in biweekly through your preferred mode to offer any needed context.

11. CWW reports status updates on economic security applications/benefits to ACS.

12. ERN reports back to their relevant agencies on any status updates about the economic security support activities they have pursued.

• ACS-Contracted ERNs: Reports on support activities to ACS using the Economic Security Activity Reporting form.
• DSS-Contracted ERNs: Reports on support activities to DSS.
• Other-Contracted ERNs: May report on support activities to ACS pending agency/funder approval.