Family Compass

Family Compass is the largest nonprofit in North Texas dedicated uniquely to the mission of child abuse prevention with the sole purpose of keeping vulnerable children from entering the overburdened child welfare system. Our agency enters the lives of children at-risk for abuse, and provides their parents with support, education, mentoring, and tools to aid them in becoming stronger, healthier families. Most of the parents we serve are low-income, single mothers who are under-resourced and lack knowledge about healthy parenting, child development, discipline, nutrition, and infant care.
Our programs work in synergy to protect children and build healthy families in North Texas. They are proven to:
• Teach positive parenting skills.
• Reinforce healthy and effective discipline techniques.
• Build strong parent-child relationships.
• Provide access to community resources.
• Improve child health and safety.
• Create a measurable reduction in child abuse and neglect.

Family Compass implements nationally accredited, evidence-based programs which are voluntary, free-of-charge, and target families with an elevated risk for child abuse throughout Dallas and Collin County. The Home Mentoring arm of our programing which includes Parent Aide and Growing As Parents is long-term and provides voluntary, tailored in-home services through case management for struggling families for 2-5 years. The Community Education and Outreach arm of our programming seeks to infuse communities with education, information, knowledge, & skills about parenting best practices in order to prevent child abuse.

Additionally, Family Compass introduced a new initiative in 2019 with a focus on fathers, a group often overlooked in social services. This program works to teach dads positive parenting skills, emotional education, and addresses the importance of a father in a child's life.

Family Compass identifies high-risk families according to the Centers for Disease Control & Prevention
(CDC) categories including those with high poverty, low educational attainment, young parental age, history
of substance abuse and/or mental health issues, history of domestic violence, and a parental history of child
abuse. In-home sessions are implemented by case managers that are highly skilled and posses either a Master's level degree, a licensed Clinician certificate, or a minimum of a Bachelor's Degree.

We have worked to increase our staffing by adding new positions throughout our programming service including bilingual staff. In line with our current Strategic Plan, we will add at least two more program staff members.

According the CDC, it costs $831,000 to address each case of child abuse and neglect. Last year, we kept 618 children from entering the child welfare system. That's enough to fill an entire school. From a community investment level, we saved our community $514 million dollars last year alone.

Our 2022 overarching, outcomes-driven, accomplishment is that Family Compass served 1,851 high-risk children and parents. Of those served through Home Mentoring Programs, 98% of the families did not have referrals into the Child Welfare System.
1,851 children and parents served by our programming (40% increase over 2021)
103% increase in fathers served = 24% of total served population
98% of families served did not have a CPS referral
100% of families were connected to resources to meet basic needs
93% of children were developmentally on-target for their age
94% of parents were either employed or in school
94% of primary parents reported an increase in at least one protective factor against child maltreatment
96% of primary parents reported a decrease in at least one risk factor against child maltreatment
164 sessions provided to parents by graduate counseling student interns