The Patricia Project – ANROWS Compass Issue 03/2017

Introduction

PAThways and Research In Collaborative Inter-Agency practice (the PATRICIA Project) is an action research project focused on the collaborative relationship between specialist communitybased domestic and family violence (DFV) support services for women and their children, and statutory child protection (CP) organisations.

The PATRICIA Project drew together a diverse range of participants from five states of Australia (New South Wales [NSW], Queensland [Qld], South Australia [SA], Victoria [Vic.], and Western Australia [WA]). The PATRICIA Project comprised five components of research, each with its own methodology, set within an action research framework (see Figure 1) that facilitated a process of changing things while simultaneously studying the “problems” of developing collaborative work and strengthening perpetrator accountability (Wicks, Reason, & Bradbury, 2008). The intended outcome was to use evidence to foster greater collaboration to support the safety and wellbeing of women and their children, and strengthen accountability for perpetrators of DFV.

The PATRICIA Project found that no “silver bullet” emerged as the one factor that made a difference to collaborative processes between DFV specialist organisations and child protection departments. Instead, a complex array of factors enabled or challenged the collaborative working. Some of these elements would be common across all collaborations; others were specific to the statutory and DFV context.

The following Compass publication provides resources to guide policy and practice in two main sections. Part 1 provides the Collaborative Practice Framework for Child Protection and Specialist Domestic and Family Violence. The framework was designed to build, maintain, and sustain collaboration where DFV involving children was identified. It pays particular attention to the safety of women and children and the complex array of factors which need to be addressed to support collaboration between the DFV and CP sectors. Part 2 summarises the recommendations for policy and practice emerging from the whole project.

Part 1: Collaborative Practice Framework for Child Protection and Specialist Domestic and Family Violence

Introduction to the practice framework

Although there has been a longstanding emphasis on the importance of using research evidence in practice, conceptualising and illustrating the means through which this occurs is often underdeveloped in the literature. There is a confusing array of terms describing this use of knowledge in action—for example, knowledge translation, knowledge transfer, dissemination, and knowledge exchange (Graham et al. 2006). While researchers often provide recommendations for practice at the end of their research reports, these are rarely framed in practitioner user-friendly ways.

The development of practice frameworks that draw upon multiple sources of knowledge has been identified as one way of bridging the research and practice divide. According to Connolly and Healy (2013, p. 31) “a practice framework integrates empirical research, practice theories, ethical principles, and experiential knowledge in a compact and convenient format that helps practitioners to use the knowledge to inform their everyday work”. Influenced by the development of practice frameworks, particularly in the child and family welfare area (Connolly, Kiraly, McCrae, & Mitchell, 2016), and the Graham et al. (2006) knowledge into action process, the PATRICIA Project has used findings from the research process to generate a practice framework that can be used to inform the child protection1 and domestic and family violence collaborative interface. The Collaborative Practice Framework relates specifically to the way in which domestic and family violence and child protection services work together to make decisions about referrals and who should respond to them. Although relevant to frontline practice, the framework is positioned at the higher level of collaborative practices