System Review 2019-01: Enhanced Response: Restraining and Secluding Children [New Hampshire]

Through the lens of child welfare there are layers of safety nets employed to ensure parents are doing what they need to do to keep children safe. At school, recreation programs, churches, and all the community intersections a child encounters, people are watching after the children and, when needed, will step in to offer assistance or prompt protective action. When children are removed from their home and community for whatever reason, it falls to the State child welfare system to ensure safety and wellbeing at an even higher standard than parents would be expected to provide, because just leaving home sets a child back in the trajectory of development. Children placed in institutional settings are hidden from community view. Children who are institutionalized have the highest risk of being restrained,1 and yet the restraint and seclusion of children placed in institutional settings is a hidden practice. The incidence of restraint and seclusion in New Hampshire may therefore come as a surprise. New Hampshire Office of the Child Advocate CLICK HERE