National casa/GAL partners with state and local member programs to support court-appointed volunteers who advocate for a child's best interest and work to strengthen families. 941 state and local…

This $16,467,895 Cooperative Agreement award from the U.S. Department of Justice's Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention (CFDA #16.756 - Court Appointed Special Advocates) supports the National CASA Association's efforts to increase court-appointed advocacy services for abused and neglected children in the foster care system.

The funding will enable the National CASA Association to provide approximately $13 million in sub-awards to local and state CASA/Guardian ad Litem (GAL) programs. These sub-awards will help the local programs start new initiatives, expand services, recruit diverse volunteers, and enhance their capacity to deliver advocacy services. The overarching goal is to increase the number of children served by CASA/GAL volunteers, improve volunteer recruitment and training, and promote positive outcomes like family reunification, kinship care, adoption, and legal guardianship.

National casa/GAL partners with state and local member programs to support court-appointed volunteers who advocate for a child's best interest and work to strengthen families. 941 state and local casa/GAL programs in 49 states and the district of columbia recruit, train and supervise 88,000 volunteers. They work individually with 227,500 children to ensure the best interests of the children are known and addressed by the court, child welfare system and community. Studies have demonstrated the life-changing impact of the casa/GAL model: children are less likely to RE-enter the system after case closure, more likely to do better in school and they and their families are more likely to receive needed services. The nationwide casa/GAL network currently does not have the capacity to serve all children in foster care with best interest advocacy. As a primary method of increasing services, national casa/GAL will provide subawards to local and state casa/GAL organizations to start new programs, expand services and recruit more and diverse volunteers to serve children. Requested funding will provide nearly $13 million in subawards for program growth, volunteer recruitment, strategic planning demonstration projects, capacity-building and needs-based support. Efforts resulting from funding will increase the number of programs, jurisdictions served, volunteers assigned and children served, and support innovative service delivery, improve capacity and help sustain services. Other activities for which funding will support are youth and family engagement and a grants management system.