Institute for Child and Family Well-Being

06/03/2026

05/20/2026

As we have reached our final episode of season 4, I keep coming back to the simple question I've asked throughout this season: What stories shape how we see the world, and how can we tell them differently?

We've spent this season exploring that question from every angle. We've heard how dominant narratives get stuck in the past; how poverty became neglect in federal law, how the "monster" frame lets society off the hook, how mandated reporting leads to surveillance instead of support.

We've learned that narratives aren't just stories we tell, they're patterns in our thinking. They're the invisible architecture that shapes how we see families in crisis, how we design our systems, and what we believe is possible.

And we've heard from people doing the hard work of changing those narratives: Rinku Sen, learning from social justice movements. Dr. Pegah Faed, building community pathways to support instead of child welfare investigations. Desmond Meade, Pardeep Singh Kaleka and Claudia Rowe, refusing the "monster" and enemy narratives to instead dig into complexity and build relationships across divides.

So, how do we actually do this? How do we move from harmful narratives to constructive ones? How do we measure whether it's working? And most importantly, how do we maintain hope when the work is slow, when we face backsliding, when the dominant narratives feel overwhelming?

Today, Jessica Moyer from the FrameWorks Institute returns to help us synthesize so much of what we've learned this season from so many narrative changemakers and chart a path forward. Because if narrative change is about tilling the soil, preparing the ground for new ways of thinking to grow, then we need to understand exactly what we're planting and how to tend it.

Jess has been our guide throughout this season, helping us understand the mechanics of how narratives work. Today, she helps us move from diagnosis to action. From understanding what's broken to building what could be.

This is episode 14: Offering Up a Positive Vision. https://overloaded-understanding-neglect.simplecast.com/episodes/offering-up-a-positive-vision-with-jessica-moyer

Subscribe and listen wherever you follow your podcasts.

Children's Wisconsin University of Wisconsin Milwaukee UWM Helen Bader School of Social Welfare Casey Family Programs Radio Milwaukee Tarik Jelani Moody Brightpoint IL Institute for Family Waypoint Children's Home Society of NC Luke Waldo Nathan J. Fink Prevent Child Abuse America Desmond Meade

05/12/2026

84% of Wisconsin neglect cases last year were unsubstantiated.

75% of those families were already getting public assistance.

The barrier isn't bad parents. It isn't even bad data. It's the script we're using when the old narrative shows up in the room.

We built a training for anyone working to change that conversation. Free. Virtual. June 3rd.

Swipe to see what you'll learn. Link in bio to register.
https://chwi.zoom.us/meeting/register/dQ8s0xtHR1y9DZ0vAugXsw

05/06/2026

Last episode, we explored how media either reinforces or challenges dominant narratives. We heard about the responsibility of journalism and the media to move beyond the monster narrative and report with context rather than just crisis. But what happens when you're living inside that story, when the headlines are about your father's murder, your community's trauma, your faith being erased?

Today, we welcome Pardeep Singh Kaleka, clinical director at Mental Health America of Wisconsin and co-author of The Gift of Our Wounds. On August 5, 2012, a white supremacist murdered seven people at the Sikh Temple of Wisconsin in Oak Creek, including Pardeep's father, the deadliest hate crime in a house of worship in nearly 50 years. The dominant narrative was simple and dangerous: an isolated act by an evil man, a monster.

But Pardeep knew that if violence has no roots, then healing has no path. Three years later, he gave a TEDx talk titled "Monster" that refused to let the narrative give society an excuse.

Pardeep has told his story many times, but I wanted to bring him on to explore it through the lens of narratives and their impacts. How do we challenge narratives that erase communities? How do we refuse the monster frame without excusing harm? And in our algorithmically sliced world, how do we create genuine contact across difference? Pardeep reminds us that we're all just walking each other home if we're willing to show up with curiosity, vulnerability, and grace.

This is episode 12, "Walking Each Other Home: Narrative Disruption Through Authentic Relationships". https://overloaded-understanding-neglect.simplecast.com/episodes/walking-each-other-home-narrative-disruption-through-authentic-relationships-with-pardeep-singh-kaleka

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Children's Wisconsin UWM Helen Bader School of Social Welfare Casey Family Programs Mental Health America Prevent Child Abuse America Brightpoint IL TED Nathan J. Fink Luke Waldo

04/29/2026

Spring 2020: the world shut down. Schools closed, families sheltered in place, and a narrative began to spread through newsrooms across the country.
Children were unsafe at home, without teachers watching, without mandated reporters, abuse would become invisible. It was a narrative born of genuine concern, but it was also an... “alarmist media narrative.” And it was doing harm.

But what happens when the people who know better - child welfare experts, advocates, people with lived experience - decide they're not going to let that narrative stand? What happens when they don't just push back but build something new? And what happens when they track, measure, and actually change how the media tells stories about families?

This is Episode 11: Changing the Story. Today, we're exploring how journalism and media both create and challenge narratives; how a network of experts and advocates came together to confront harmful media narratives about children and families; how they built strategies that actually work; and how counter-narratives aren't just responses, they're architecture.
Subscribe and listen wherever you follow your podcasts. https://overloaded-understanding-neglect.simplecast.com/episodes/changing-the-story

.mke

04/27/2026

Families may need extra support when stress, housing instability, medical needs, work obligations, or gaps in childcare begin to pile up. Without safe, short-term support, everyday challenges can quickly become crises.

Crisis childcare and respite services help ease that burden by giving caregivers a safe place to turn before situations escalate.

Join ICFW for a webinar featuring The Wraparound Emergency Child Care Advocacy Network, La Causa’s Crisis Nursery, and RISE Respite Care to learn how these services support overloaded families, help prevent neglect, and strengthen community support systems.

Thursday, May 7 | 9–10 AM
Registration link: https://chwi.zoom.us/meeting/register/uT_jGVbJS9WNeUAFP2RhTg

Children's Wisconsin Wellpoint Care Network Brightpoint IL Prevent Child Abuse America La Causa, Inc. RISE Wisconsin, Inc.

04/15/2026

Last episode, we explored how art, culture, food, and music create the connective tissue that makes narrative change possible. We heard how shared meals break down barriers, how music creates belonging, and how cultural expression helps us see each other's full humanity. These weren't abstract ideas, they were recipes for building the relationships that movements and narratives require.

From this last episode, new questions emerged. Once you've built those relationships, once you've shifted how people see families in crisis, how does changing the story change the system? Because narrative change without structural change is just conversation. And structural change without narrative change doesn't last.

Today, we're exploring what happens when an organization works intentionally and strategically to get both sides of that equation right; when they pair strategic narrative work with concrete policy advocacy, when they match new language with new pathways of support.

I am thrilled to welcome Dr. Pegah Faed, Safe & Sound’s CEO, to share how small, community-based organizations’ narrative change can drive systems-level change that influences statewide practice and policy, and how working strategically with aligned partners can make all the difference. Today’s conversation is the beginning of that partnership between our team and theirs.

Welcome to Episode 10: From Narrative to Systems Change: Mandated Reporting to Community Supporting

Subscribe and listen wherever you follow your podcasts. https://overloaded-understanding-neglect.simplecast.com/episodes/from-narrative-to-systems-change-mandated-reporting-to-community-supporting-with-dr-pegah-faed

Children's Wisconsin UWM Helen Bader School of Social Welfare Safe & Sound Casey Family Programs Wisconsin Department of Children and Families Luke Waldo Nathan J. Fink Brightpoint IL

04/13/2026

Annie’s first story offered insight into the lived realities of direct practice. In this post, she reflects on the role supervisory and organizational supports can play in sustaining the workforce amid burnout, high demands, and the emotional weight of the work. Her perspective is a reminder that workforce challenges are never solely about positions or tasks. They are also about whether professionals feel supported, valued, and equipped to continue showing up for children, families, and communities.



Children's Wisconsin University of Wisconsin Milwaukee Annie Van Hoof

04/08/2026

We've spent this season asking hard questions. How did we get here? Why do certain narratives keep us divided and stuck? What are the mental models that shape how we see families, how we design systems, and how we decide who belongs?

We've learned that changing narratives isn't easy. It requires understanding mental models, and the art and neuroscience of storytelling. It demands that we confront generations of harmful framing. It asks us to imagine what's possible often before we can see it.

But here's what I keep coming back to, that inspires me to keep going: Somewhere, right now, people are already doing it, imagining what’s possible and building better narratives.

Through a meal shared across difference. Through art that makes the invisible visible. Through music that finds the thread between cultures. Through spaces where people feel safe and empowered being themselves instead of shrinking into the background.

Today, we're exploring the recipes for success with Emerald Mills-Williams, Shary Tran, Rinku Sen, and Tarik Jelani Moody.

Welcome to Episode 9: Recipes for Success: Building Community Through Food, Art, and Culture.

Subscribe and listen wherever you follow your podcasts. https://overloaded-understanding-neglect.simplecast.com/episodes/recipes-for-success-building-community-through-food-art-and-culture

Diverse Dining Children's Wisconsin ElevAsian Radio Milwaukee HYFIN University of Wisconsin Milwaukee UWM Helen Bader School of Social Welfare Casey Family Programs Nathan J. Fink Luke Waldo Ex Fabula

04/01/2026

Last episode, we explored the science and art of how stories really work, how they activate our brains differently than data alone, how they create emotional resonance that moves us to action, and how the strategic craft of storytelling can shift hearts, minds, and ultimately, change systems.

But here's the question that's been lingering for me throughout this season: We're not the first people to face entrenched, harmful narratives. We're not the first to ask how culture changes, how minds shift, how systems bend toward justice.

So what can we learn from those who came before us? From the abolitionists who reframed enslavement as a moral crisis? From the labor organizers who shifted "individual failure" to "collective exploitation"? From the civil rights movement that transformed "separate but equal" into a demand for dignity and belonging?
What lessons have our elders left us about how narrative power actually works in the messy, sustained work of social change?

Today, we welcome Rinku Sen, executive director of the Narrative Initiative and social justice strategist who has spent the last several years in the archives, studying these questions.

Welcome to Episode 8: Hearing Our Elders to Build Better Narratives Today

Listen and subscribe wherever you follow your podcasts. https://overloaded-understanding-neglect.simplecast.com/episodes/hearing-our-elders-to-build-better-narratives-today-with-rinku-sen

Children's Wisconsin UWM Helen Bader School of Social Welfare University of Wisconsin Milwaukee Rinku Sen Narrative Initiative Race Forward AP AP Stylebook Prevent Child Abuse America Nathan J. Fink Luke Waldo