Introducing the Child & Youth Well-Being Plan and Outcomes Framework

I really appreciate that this plan recognizes the importance of prevention, family-centred practice, Indigenous partnerships, and better collaboration across ministries and services. These ideas aren’t new to those of us working with children and families, but it’s encouraging to see them reflected in a provincial plan. It’s also great to see recognition that children’s well-being is influenced by much more than health care or education. Housing, food security, transportation, caregiver well-being, and strong communities all play an important role.

From my perspective as an Infant Development Consultant, the challenge isn’t knowing what needs to be done—it’s having the time, people, resources, and systems to actually do it well. Families don’t experience government in separate ministries. They experience one system, and when that system doesn’t work together, they’re the ones left trying to figure it all out. They repeat their stories over and over, navigate complicated eligibility requirements, and spend countless hours trying to figure out who to call next.

One area where I think relatively small changes could make a big difference is improving communication between services. Families shouldn’t have to tell their story multiple times or go through duplicate assessments when that information already exists. Better communication, shared service planning (with consent), and clearer referral pathways would reduce frustration for families and allow professionals to spend more time supporting children instead of navigating systems.

Helping families understand and navigate available services would also make a huge difference. Many parents don’t know what programs exist, what they’re eligible for, or how different services connect. Families are often expected to become experts in a system they’ve never had to use before, all while caring for a child with additional needs.

I also think the plan could place even more emphasis on the earliest years of life. We know the first three years are critical for brain development, and early identification and intervention can have a lifelong impact. Investing in services like Infant Development Programs, speech-language pathology, occupational therapy, physiotherapy, Supported Child Development, and family supports is one of the best investments we can make for children and families.

Where I think bigger system changes are needed is around service capacity. Collaboration is important, but collaboration alone won’t shorten waitlists or fill vacant positions. Many families are still waiting months, sometimes years, for developmental assessments, pediatric specialists, therapy services, and mental health supports. Frontline professionals are doing their best while managing large caseloads, but there simply aren’t enough people or resources to meet the need.

Working in a rural community brings additional challenges that I don’t think are fully reflected in the plan. In many rural communities, professionals already work closely together because we know each other. The bigger barriers are recruiting and keeping specialized professionals, limited local access to services, long travel distances, and even transportation challenges like BC Ferries. Better coordination is important, but it can’t replace services that simply aren’t available or unreliable.

I like the focus on measuring outcomes rather than just counting how many services are delivered. At the same time, if agencies are expected to collect more data, they’ll also need the time, funding, administrative support, and technology to do that well. Otherwise, it means more paperwork and less time spent with children and families.

One thing I found myself looking for while reading the plan was more information about how all of this will actually happen. The vision is strong, but I wanted to see more concrete details and less pretty buzzwords. What are the timelines? What funding has been committed? Who is responsible for each part? What are the priorities over the next few years? Without those pieces, it’s difficult to know how these ideas will move from a vision into meaningful change on the ground.

Overall, I support the direction of this plan. It reflects many of the values and practices that those of us in early childhood have believed in for a long time. My hope is that the next step focuses on turning this vision into action by investing in the workforce, reducing wait times, strengthening early intervention, and giving frontline agencies the resources they need to provide the coordinated, family-centred support that children and families deserve.

A plan and framework is only as good as the leadership, capacity and funds to maintain the high demands for children and youth. Unfortunately, The cost of education and cost of living is a huge barrier for building capacity to carry out this plan. There needs to be a process for hiring staff that tests their actual willingness to support and understanding for children, youth and families. There is currently too many employees in positions that require a specific skill “caring” and they don’t have it and are straight and narrow attitude I do my job you do yours, no working together, no networking to build supports for those they are supporting. Voluntary programs for youth is so disheartening to a family struggling to get supports for their child that deeply needs it. We need option where youth will have services that are not just voluntary, a system to look back at services provided not just individual stats for funding purposes. This includes those that are in the education, social services and community services fields.

Appreciate:
– cross-government collaboration and strategic partnership- reduction of silos and shared visioning across government organizations is the only approach that will truly make a difference for British Columbians
-addressing wellness from multiple factors and lens, recognizing that primary needs being met with allow for more foundational and sustainable change
– up-stream approaches that are not all reactive
-recognition that enhancing wellness for children and youth, families builds more robust, safer, healthier communities

Needs more attention:
– experience of refugee, immigrant families and strategies to support. We have a growing population of immigrants to BC who come with medically complex children, those who have experienced trauma, need support with adjustment to Canada etc. This is missing in this framework- more intention should be on focused on this area
– children with medical complexity- the systems that children with medical complexity continue to be siloed, with disparate services and vastly different experiences in decision making, access and allocation of services geographically. I am not certain the new system properly addresses the inequities or needs, but rather moves the same funding around to spread across more people.
– need for caregiver benefits for longer for parents with medically complex/palliative children are not worrying about finances while also caring for their medically complex children- again, the experience is grossly different geographically
– Enhancing benefits through At Home program for food, nutritional supplements and other common needs that are not currently covered will enhance health and reduce financial burden on families
– Transportation for medical respite- not currently covered but as the only medical respite for palliative children is in LM, consideration should be included

I’m also curious about family engagement and having families involved directly in the drafting, revising, execution and outcome measures. Compensating families so they can be at the decision making table will be a significant step forward for family empowerment, health and wellness

For decades, Guardianship, CYSN, and CYMH staff have worked together to build integrated teams that support young people and simplify service navigation. Right now, the most vulnerable children and youth—those involved in child protection, CYSN, and CYMH—are all served within a single Ministry. This structure makes collaboration easier and reduces the risk of young people falling through service gaps.

No evidence has been presented to show that breaking the Ministry apart would improve outcomes for children.

The risk is that fragmenting services (by dividing the Ministry up) could create the same isolation and segregation we are trying to prevent. For example, doctors within Health Authorities already report significant challenges navigating the child welfare system, often noting that children fall between the cracks. If CYMH were moved into Health Authorities, the gap between mental health services and the child welfare system would widen even further—making coordination harder, not easier, for the young people who need it most.

– Lack of clarity in the plan — It is unclear what is happening, when it will occur, and who is responsible for each component.

– Use of “tell your story once” messaging — The A Pathway to Hope tagline (“Families will only need to tell their story once”) is not realistic. Privacy legislation such as FOIPPA, FIPPA, and the YCJA restricts broad information sharing; staff cannot know “everything about everyone,” even with a shared IT system; and families do not want all government staff to have full access to their personal information.

– Information sharing already exists—with consent — Professionals can already share information when consent is provided. The plan does not make it clear whether consent-based sharing will remain a requirement.

– Unclear cross‑ministry roles and responsibilities — A Pathway to Hope was designed as a cross‑ministry initiative, yet Integrated Child and Youth Teams have faced criticism for lacking clinical clarity, operational clarity, and role clarity. It is not practical for every Ministry to be responsible for mental health—just as it would not be practical for every Ministry to be responsible for policing or road maintenance. Allowing each community to design its own ICY model also recreates the same issues CYMH faced before a provincial model existed: inconsistent services, unclear clinical frameworks, and wide variation in family experience.

– Need for structured accountability tools — Using tools such as a RACI framework would help define roles, responsibilities, and accountabilities across Ministries.

– Navigator roles are promising — Early Help Navigators appear helpful, and adding Complex Situation Navigators could further support families with high‑needs cases.

– Public confidence requires clarity about Ministry changes — As Ministries merge or shift (MCFD, SDPR, Health, Citz), public confidence would improve if government articulated how the new structures will differ from past models, what research informs the changes, and what will be done differently this time.

– Creating Lean processes and centralizing services such as IMIT is an enabler to service delivery. Centralizing services is not the same thing as “families only need to tell their story once” it is about efficient use of resources

Disbanding AFU and gutting the At Home Program are going to cost a lot more down the road. Our health, education and judicial systems will be overwhelmed even more than they are now.

This is a massive mistake and will cost our province much more in a few years.

We need to keep AFU and also create a similar system for other disabled children.

There are only 1200-2000 Down’s syndrome children in BC that we need to help. 36% of those children already have access to the At Home Program and have access to $17000 for therapy throughout their childhood. Those kids will see a reduction of this support in the new system.

The new system will mean many families will have to have one parent leave the workforce which will mean less taxes paid.

The BC Coalition to End Youth Homelessness policy asks emphasize prevention, continuity of care, and systems alignment so that youth aging out of care and/or facing homelessness experience stability, connection, and a genuine sense of belonging rather than repeated disruption.
Issue
Youth aging out of care face intersecting barriers across income assistance, housing, health, and child welfare systems that undermine stability, continuity, and a sense of belonging—significantly increasing the risk of homelessness.
Why this matters now
• Youth homelessness is preventable with timely, coordinated policy interventions
• Current system misalignment creates avoidable costs across emergency housing, health, and justice systems
• Government has an opportunity to strengthen outcomes for youth aging out of care by addressing known policy barriers
BCCEYH priority policy asks
1. Remove employment disincentives by raising or eliminating earnings caps for youth and former youth in care on income assistance
2. Link mental health supports to education and employment for youth receiving income assistance
3. Improve coordination between SAJE and housing systems, including better data transparency
4. Expand Specialized Homes and transitional housing to ensure stable housing for youth aged 17–27 leaving care
5. Expand age appropriate transitional housing options for 17-18 year old’s within BC Housing or allow 17–18 year olds access to supportive housing
6. Update the definition of Affordable rent so that it is tied to an individuals income, cost of living and not determined based on market rents.

What success looks like
• Every youth leaving care has access to stable, affordable housing for 2–5 years
• Youth can pursue education and employment without losing income security
• Ministries coordinate around shared outcomes, data, and transition planning
What we are asking for
• Cross ministry engagement to advance these policy priorities
• Commitment to coordinated planning and data informed decision making focused on youth homelessness prevention

I’m concerned about a plan that aspires to provide the support that children need is situated in a context with decreasing k-12 public funding. The public education budget not only fails to keep up with inflation, the ratio of government spending on education is DECREASING. This is abhorrent and makes a plan like this impossible.

You cannot support learners when there are not nearly enough EAs in classrooms. You can force more literacy screening, but a child with dyslexia (like mine) will not be adequately supported…..because…inadequate funding. There are not enough non-enrolling teachers to teach him to read! There is not enough money to buy decodable readers/ books for children like him to use.

Why are only low-occurring disabilities funded? Districts are supposed to magically stretch funds dedicated to the needs of a tiny few towards the needs of the unfunded many. This makes no sense and is in direct contradiction to a Plan like this. You will never be able to support children with disabilities in schools unless schools are adequately funded. They have the RIGHT to be supported.

You will not attain any of these mental health goals as there are inadequate counselors and trained mental health workers in schools.

You will not recruit and retain teachers into an under-funded system. They are stressed and over worked because students are not receiving the in-school support they require and deserve. They are leaving because they are working in untenable situations in buildings with decades of deferred maintenance (poor air quality, decaying buildings).

You speak of wanting to prevent intimate partner violence or substance abuse before it starts. Guess where children are ALL to learn about this in rigorous and research/ outcome supported ways? The k-12 PHE Curriculum. But a system that is chronically and acutely under-funded cuts what 1st? Music/ Drama/ PHE. Devaluing PHE means that children are NOT receiving the health education they deserve. BC has an incredibly strong PHE Curriculum that is not adequately delivered because…there are fires to put out with a shoe-string budget.

Across the document, including the illustrative stories (e.g., “Cole” and “Jonah”), the system response is framed around building coordinated supports after difficulties become visible through school disruption, reduced attendance, or crisis escalation. While the intent is to improve coordination, the practical effect in the examples is that children are already experiencing significant exclusion or instability before meaningful intervention occurs.

The plan also relies heavily on concepts such as:

* “integrated response tables”
* “family navigators”
* “early help specialists”
* “wraparound supports”

However, there is limited detail on:

* who is delivering these roles (existing clinicians vs new hires)
* how staffing shortages will be addressed
* how services will be distributed equitably across regions
* what enforceable expectations exist for schools and districts

This creates a concern that the plan is strong on system design language but unclear on implementation capacity and accountability.

From a school perspective, it also stands out that exclusionary practices (e.g., reduced school days, partial attendance, or removal due to behaviour or overwhelm) are treated as existing conditions the system responds to, rather than practices the system is required to prevent.

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What stands out to you about this plan for children, youth, and families – and why?

What stands out is the emphasis on managing complexity through coordination rather than ensuring baseline access to services within core environments like schools.

In the school-focused examples (e.g., Cole’s story), the child’s reduced access to education is not prevented but instead becomes the starting point for layered intervention:

* expedited assessments
* navigators
* therapy referrals
* financial supports
* housing supports

This creates a pattern where the system response appears to focus on building supports around exclusion rather than preventing exclusion itself.

This is particularly concerning in relation to children with disability-related needs who experience:

* sensory overwhelm
* anxiety-driven school avoidance
* behavioural responses to unmet needs
* inconsistent school attendance due to lack of appropriate supports

In these situations, families are often already:

* advocating across multiple systems
* managing inconsistent school responses
* trying to coordinate care without system support

The plan’s emphasis on navigation and coordination may improve experience in theory, but without clear guarantees of in-school support delivery and prevention of reduced instructional time, it risks shifting responsibility onto families to navigate increasingly complex systems rather than ensuring accessibility at the point of education.

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Are there areas where small changes in services, supports, or how systems work together might make a meaningful difference, or where more understanding is needed?

Yes—there are several areas where relatively targeted changes could significantly improve the effectiveness of the plan without requiring a full redesign.

1. Clear trigger points for early intervention (before exclusion)

More detail is needed on when supports are activated, especially in schools.

For example:

* Does repeated absenteeism automatically trigger support before schedules are reduced?
* Are there thresholds where intervention must occur before exclusionary practices are used?

Without this clarity, support risks being activated only after breakdown.

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2. Clarity on Integrated Response Tables vs school accountability

The Integrated Response Table model appears useful for coordination, but it is unclear:

* whether it can intervene early in school decision-making
* whether it has authority to prevent or reverse reduced school attendance decisions
* how it interacts with existing school governance structures

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3. Diagnosis vs needs-based access pathway clarity

The plan states supports should be needs-based, but in practice examples:

* assessment still functions as a gate to higher levels of support

More clarity is needed on:

* what supports are immediately available without diagnosis
* what supports require assessment
* expected timelines for assessment completion

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4. Workforce implementation detail

More understanding is needed on:

* which clinicians are expected to deliver supports (OT, SLP, psychology, etc.)
* whether new staff will be hired or existing staff redistributed
* how rural and high-need areas will be staffed

Without this, integration risks remaining conceptual rather than operational.

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Are there areas where broad scale changes are needed?

Yes—particularly in relation to schools, accountability, and inclusion practices.

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1. Preventing exclusion, not responding to it

A key gap is the lack of explicit commitment to prevent:

* reduced school days
* informal removal from classrooms
* partial attendance as a default response to disability-related needs

Broad scale change is needed to ensure:

children are not moved out of full participation in education as a first-line response to unmet needs.

Instead, supports should be embedded within full-time school participation wherever possible, with clear accountability when this is not achieved.

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2. Accountability for educational access decisions

The plan emphasizes shared responsibility across systems, but does not clearly assign accountability for:

* decisions to reduce instructional time
* ongoing exclusion from full participation
* cumulative loss of learning time

Without clear accountability structures (e.g., school districts or designated roles), exclusion risks becoming diffuse and difficult to challenge.

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3. Strengthening IEP commitments

The reference to new or updated IEP guidelines is noted, but the plan lacks clarity on whether these changes will be:

* enforceable
* rights-based
* linked to minimum service guarantees

Key missing elements include:

* whether IEPs guarantee access to specific supports
* whether there are consequences for non-implementation
* whether reduced instructional time is tracked or limited

As written, the IEP changes appear procedural rather than structural, and may not meaningfully change access to education.

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4. Shifting from reactive integration to proactive access

While integration is a central theme of the plan, the current framing risks:

* improving coordination after children are already struggling
* rather than ensuring early, embedded supports that prevent escalation

A broader shift is needed toward:

embedding supports in everyday environments (especially schools) before crisis or exclusion occurs.

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Where things are working well

There are important strengths in the plan, particularly in its recognition that:

* families are currently navigating fragmented systems
* coordination across health, education, and social services is often difficult
* Indigenous-led and culturally grounded supports are essential
* early help and prevention are important system goals

The emphasis on reducing administrative burden on families and improving system navigation is also positive in principle.

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Where there are gaps or challenges

The most significant gaps include:

* lack of implementation detail (workforce, funding, staffing)
* limited accountability for school-based exclusion practices
* unclear triggers for early intervention
* reliance on crisis or breakdown scenarios in examples
* limited clarity on enforceable service entitlements in schools
* diagnosis still functioning as a practical access bottleneck in some pathways

For families with children who experience ongoing overwhelm, school avoidance, or disability-related participation barriers, these gaps matter because they determine whether support arrives early—or after significant disruption has already occurred.

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Where different supports or services are working well together

The concept of integrated response (bringing schools, health, mental health, and social supports together) is strong in principle.

However, its effectiveness will depend on:

* whether teams are properly resourced
* whether they have authority to act early (not only in crisis)
* whether they can influence school-level decisions directly
* whether families still carry the coordination burden

Without these conditions, integration risks becoming an additional layer on top of existing fragmentation rather than a replacement for it.

I welcome the Province’s commitment to improving child and youth well-being through prevention, coordination, family support, Indigenous self-determination, and addressing the systemic barriers that affect children and families. The Action Plan reflects an important shift away from crisis-driven responses toward creating the conditions that allow children, youth, and families to thrive.

I encourage government to strengthen this work by explicitly grounding the Child and Youth Well-Being Action Plan and Outcomes Framework in the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child (UNCRC). Children’s rights and child well-being are not separate concepts. Rights provide the ethical, legal, and practical foundation that helps duty bearers understand their responsibilities and remain accountable for outcomes.

Well-being tells us what we hope children experience. Rights clarify what governments, institutions, professionals, communities, and parents are obligated to do to make those experiences possible. Without a rights framework, well-being risks remaining aspirational. Rights transform aspiration into shared responsibility, expectation, and accountability.

Child rights literacy also offers a practical pathway for parents and professionals to understand and enact well-being in everyday practice. It shifts the focus from controlling children’s behaviour toward supporting their development, participation, protection, identity, belonging, and agency. In practice, this means moving from questions of compliance (“How do I get children to behave?”) toward relational questions (“What do children need, and what are we responsible for providing so they can thrive?”).

This shift is deeply aligned with reconciliation.

For too long, systems of childhood in Canada have been shaped by transactional and compliance-based assumptions: that children are recipients of adult decisions, that “good outcomes” are produced through control, and that professional authority sits above lived experience. These assumptions have also shaped colonial systems of child welfare, education, and family support, often disconnecting children from culture, language, identity, and relational belonging.

A rights-based and reconciliation-aligned approach requires a different foundation, relationalism.

Relational childhood recognizes that children are not objects of intervention but participants in relationships, systems, and communities. It affirms that well-being is not produced through compliance or extraction of “desired behaviours,” but through relationships of care, responsibility, reciprocity, and belonging. This aligns directly with Indigenous worldviews that emphasize interdependence, kinship, and the responsibilities that exist between people, land, and community.

Child rights provide the explicit expectations that make this relational shift operational. They clarify that children are rights holders, not passive recipients; that families are knowledge holders and experts in their own lives; and that culture, language, and identity are not peripheral, but central to well-being. This reframes the role of duty bearers from managing behaviour to upholding conditions in which children and families can thrive.

I was encouraged to see the Action Plan recognize that “families are experts in their own lives.” I would encourage government to extend this principle further by explicitly recognizing that children are also experts in their own lives, consistent with Article 12 of the UNCRC, and that their voices must meaningfully shape the systems designed for them.

Finally, I encourage greater attention to children’s lived realities in digital environments, where identity, relationships, participation, learning, and belonging are now continuously formed. A comprehensive child and youth well-being framework must include children’s digital rights as core to modern well-being and clarify the responsibilities of duty bearers in these spaces.

Children’s rights literacy offers a practical and necessary foundation for reconciliation-informed, relational approaches to well-being. It helps shift systems away from transactional models of childhood toward relationships of responsibility, accountability, and care—where well-being is not something done to children, but something created with them.

In Protecting and Uplifting the Most Vulnerable, there is mention of keeping kids at home, and improving care and oversight for children in care. Where does kinship care fit into this? It is not mentioned in the action plan or outcomes framework. Kinship needs to be better supported, including for private kinship arrangements made outside the child welfare system. Child in the Home of a Relative program needs to come back to keep kids with family.