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All Children - All Families: Training Program
The All Children - All Families National Training Program offers expert training, capacity building and coaching on a diverse range of LGBTQ+ topics for child welfare professionals and caregivers. High-quality, engaging and evidence-based training is available virtually and in-person at a variety of durations to meet your organization’s needs, including: one hour, 90 minutes, three hour and full-day training and workshops.
The ACAF Training Program delivers training for child welfare professionals with a focus on the must-know information and skills to best serve LGBTQ+ communities. Trainings and workshops can be tailored for your staff members’ specific needs. Every training offering includes a pre/post-test and training quality evaluation tool.
Core topics include:
Introduction to LGBTQ+ Inclusion
Best Practices for Serving LGBTQ+ Youth
Best Practices for Serving LGBTQ+ Families
Advanced topics include:
LGBTQ+ Parent Recruitment
Ensuring Affirming Placements for LGBTQ+ Youth
Discussing SOGIE with Youth
The ACAF Training Program’s content for caregivers focuses on building empathy, providing information on key concepts, and connecting caregivers resources they need to continue to learn on their journey to best affirm LGBTQ+ youth. Every training offering includes a pre/post-test and training quality evaluation tool.
Core offering:
Building Safety & Trust: Supporting Youth with Diverse SOGIE
Advanced topics include:
Affirmation in Action: Helping Trans Youth Thrive
Healthcare Advocacy for LGBTQ+ Youth
School-Based Advocacy for LGBTQ+ Youth
The Training of Facilitators (TOF) program builds the capacity of organizations to deliver LGBTQ+ content to staff and caregivers. Over multiple days, the TOF equips prospective facilitators to deliver All Children – All Families training content. Prospective facilitators begin by observing training as participants and then complete classroom instruction with ACAF Expert Trainers. Prospective facilitators conduct teach-back presentations and receive feedback from ACAF Expert Trainers to ensure a firm grasp of content and teaching methods. Following completion of full program and achievement of baseline fidelity levels, participants conduct co-trainings with expert trainers as a final step to full certification to deliver content to the organization's specific training audience. Each training component includes a pre/post-test and training quality evaluation tool.
TOF Program Curricula:
Setting the Foundation: LGBTQ+ Inclusion for Child Welfare Professionals (6 hour, for professional audience)
Building Safety & Trust: Supporting Youth with Diverse SOGIE (3 hour, for caregiver audience)
Read about ACAF’s Training of Facilitators implementation with Prince George’s County (MD), Children’s Home Society of Florida and Trillium Health Resources (NC).
One-time training is never enough to ensure LGBTQ+ supportive and affirming services. The ACAF Training Program provides ongoing coaching resources for frontline staff, supervisors and agency administrators as well as “Booster” training resources to assist your ongoing training efforts. These resources are necessary for sustainable and long-term changes to happen within organizations. The ACAF Training Program can help your team go beyond LGBTQ+ 101 by supplementing your current efforts with tailored and more advanced content.
Coaching topics include:
Navigating pushback
Talking about SOGIE in supervision
Building team buy-in for LGBTQ+ inclusion efforts
“Booster” training topic resources focus on case studies and videos on a variety of topics, including:
Understanding gender identity and expression
Building empathy through stories of LGBTQ+ Youth & Families
Coming Out Experiences
Supporting Families & Caregivers of LGBTQ+ Youth
For more information on LGBTQ+ training best practices, visit these resources:
What Participants Have to Say:
“The training was excellent and really provided concrete skills for social workers to use when working with LGBTQ+ clients.”
“The ACAF Training of Facilitators experience is the most comprehensive in terms of preparation and support that I have participated in. Both the team of expert trainers and the well-developed materials serve as great learning supports for facilitators entering this work at all levels.”
“I learn best with visuals - this presentation was great! The presentation was helpful, the speakers were very knowledgeable. Great tips!”