Quality of Child Protection Services, between Facilitating Factors and Challenges. Case Study

The process of modernizing social services aims at the efficiency and effectiveness of their provision to beneficiaries at quality standards imposed at European or national level. In the residential child protection services, the assurance of the new quality standards proposed in 2019 brought with it certain challenges, but also positive results. This paper presents an overview of a residential service, as a link to the local social work system, where children separated from their parents are accommodated, on whom the placement measure was established, the analysis focusing on the identification of facilitators, but also the challenges in providing quality social services, in the context of recent legislative changes on minimum quality standards. Through a qualitative research, using interviews and direct observation, we made a topical diagnosis of social services provided in a residential child protection center in western Romania. On the one hand, the challenges faced by the members of the team of specialists and the management team, as well as the current beneficiaries and beneficiaries who have left the protection system, as direct participants in the care process, have been identified and on the other hand, their ideas and proposals for improving this process were collected. The conclusions of the study show that important steps have been taken towards the provision of quality social services, however there are still some aspects that, although meeting the minimum quality standards, analyzed in relation to the satisfaction of beneficiaries, may lead to improvements. The study aims to contribute to the efficiency of the provision of quality services in accordance with the standards proposed at national level among social service providers for child protection, bringing to the fore a case study that expands the theoretical and empirical basis of studies in the field of social service quality.


Keywords: quality, mandatory minimum standards, residential type center, communication, the degree of satisfaction among beneficiaries