INFO:

An area that has been of great concern to child welfare professionals in recent years is the lack of accepting and affirming families for LGBTQ youth in the child welfare system. This session will explore the role that foster family rejection and/or acceptance can have on the lives of youth who identify as gay and lesbian as they navigate the child welfare system. The presenter will discuss the findings of a recent study comparing the experiences of those youth who identified their foster family as accepting to those who lived with rejecting families. Specific attention will be given to the differences in the way foster parents responded to maltreatment of lesbian and gay youth, foster parent levels of comfort in discussing issues related to sexual orientation, and the manner in which foster parents treated lesbian and gay youth as compared to straight foster youth. Dr. McCormick is an assistant professor in the department of social work and Director of the MSW program. He also serves as the Director of the Child Welfare Training Collaboration, and Borderland Children’s Behavioral Health Initiative at UTEP.