American Humane Association Honors Len Dalgleish with Vincent De Francis Award

Prestigious award recognizes individuals with vision and commitment to improve child welfare systems

DENVER, Aug. 4 /PRNewswire-USNewswire/ -- The American Humane Association awarded its Vincent De Francis Award to Len Dalgleish during an award ceremony today at the University of Stirling in Scotland. The award recognizes an individual with the vision and commitment to reach across disciplines to improve child welfare systems.

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"Professor Dalgleish's research on child welfare decision making has made an important contribution in tying together decision making theory to improve outcomes for children and families who are involved with the child welfare system," said John Fluke, vice president of American Humane's Child Protection Research Center. "His work in developing the General Assessment and Decision Making model has provided a foundation for helping to focus child welfare decision making research and for improving child protection practice and policy in the U.S. and internationally."

Dalgleish, who lives and works in Scotland, has made enormous contributions to the field of child protection. In the early 1980s, Professor Dalgleish started to apply the psychology of decision making to key decisions in child protection, such as 'removal of the child from the family' and 'reunification.' His work also covers the topic of risk in child protection; specifically, Dalgleish developed practice tools for assessing risk and explored how such assessments are linked to decisions about children's futures. His research found that practitioners  often defined acceptable risk differently, meaning that even though two people may agree that risk is present, they may disagree on how to address it. He then developed workshop tools to make these differences explicit and facilitate discussions.

The Vincent De Francis Award is named after a former director of children's services for American Humane, who published many works that provide the underlying foundation of child protection as it exists today. Considered one of the fathers of child protection services, De Francis was instrumental in defining child protection as a helping, non-punitive approach. He saw it as a preventive program that "keeps families and children together by aiding them to resolve the problems underlying the neglect."

"We are delighted to present our 2010 award to Professor Dalgleish, and are currently soliciting nominations for the 2012 Vincent de Francis Award," said Sonia Velazquez, senior vice president of Child Welfare for the American Humane Association.  

American Humane, a leader in child and family services, will continue to recognize individuals and organizations for their commitment and their accomplishments in improving child welfare by presenting the Vincent De Francis Award biennially. For more information, visit www.americanhumane.org.

About American Humane

Founded in 1877, the Denver-based American Humane Association is the only national organization dedicated to protecting both children and animals from abuse and neglect through public policy, education and services reaching a wide network of organizations and advocates. Programs include raising awareness about The Link® between violence to people and violence to animals, as well as the benefits derived from the human-animal bond. The organization is also known for "No Animals Were Harmed,"® the end-credit disclaimer seen on film and TV productions. American Humane's farm animal welfare certification program, American Humane Certified™, is the nation's largest and most regarded independent standards and certification program. American Humane earned the Independent Charities of America's "Best in America" Seal of Approval. Learn more at www.americanhumane.org.

SOURCE American Humane Association