| Conclusions and Recommendations |
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The results of this preliminary assessment of cultural competency show that many VAWA funded agencies recognized the importance of addressing the specific needs of diverse and underserved populations. However, the results also suggest the need for improvement in the areas of organizational policies and procedures, ability to identify and reach underserved populations, and provision of staff training.
Most agencies reported not having established organizational policies and procedures related to cultural competency, and many agencies lacked the essential information and guidelines to do so. The vast majority of agencies reported having the technical capacity to track victims served and to identify victims representing underserved populations, but some agencies reported difficulty or discomfort recording demographic information on clients. Most agencies reported providing some outreach to underserved populations, but they did not systematically gather the information necessary to describe the underserved populations in their service area very well. This could have adversely impacted the effectiveness of targeted outreach efforts. Most agencies reported providing, or having access to, cultural competency training opportunities, but the absence of a clear understanding of cultural competency per se probably undermined reports regarding cultural competency training. Further, the trainings that were provided were generally not reflected in the form of organizational policies and procedures.
Therefore, it is recommended that:
- A Cultural Competency Plan be established to assist VAWA funded agencies in improving their level of cultural competency. Key elements of this plan should be based on a uniform definition of cultural competency, and should include:
- Developing and implementing cultural competency policies and procedures that are sensitive to the characteristics of the diverse and underserved populations in the agency service areas --- and using these policies and procedures to create a workplace environment that integrates cultural competency into the management and delivery of professional services;
- Collecting information that describes the characteristics of service area populations (including diverse and underserved populations), clients served by the agencies, and outreach efforts targeted to diverse and underserved populations --- and using this information to maximize the reach of services to these populations; and
- Identifying and implementing internal or external training for agency staff that employs well-documented cultural competency curricula --- and using this training to promote cultural competency in the daily delivery of agency services to all clients.
- A performance measurement system be developed as an integrated component of the Cultural Competency Plan, to assist VAWA funded agencies in evaluating the effectiveness of their implementation of the plan.
- Technical assistance be provided as needed to VAWA funded agencies to support them in both the implementation and evaluation of the Cultural Competency Plan.
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