Ep. 31: Working with State Agencies on Child Wellbeing with Lonnie Berger, University of Wisconsin

This month we welcome Lonnie Berger, director of the Institute for Research on Poverty and Vilas Distinguished Achievement Professor and Ph.D. Program Chair at the School of Social Work at the University of Wisconsin–Madison. His work aims to inform public policy in order to improve its capacity to assist families in accessing resources, improving family functioning and wellbeing and ensuring that children are able to grow and develop in the best possible environments. Lonnie and Chris discuss the intersection of public policy, family structures and family resources and how those affect child wellbeing. How Lonnie's grounding in social work, as opposed to a social science disipline, informs and broadens his research. Lonnie has extensive experience working with state agencies in Wisconsin around child wellbeing generally and also the foster system. He descibes specific examples of issues and successes in partnering with state agencies to further child wellbeing. Lonnie Berger is the director of the Institute for Research on Poverty and Vilas Distinguished Achievement Professor and Ph.D. Program Chair at the School of Social Work at the University of Wisconsin–Madison. He is engaged in studies in three primary areas: (1) examining the determinants of substandard parenting, child maltreatment, and out-of-home placement for children; (2) exploring associations among socioeconomic factors, parenting behaviors, and children’s care, development, and wellbeing; and (3) assessing the influence of public policies on parental behaviors and child and family well-being.