Annemiek Harder and Mónica López López board members of EUSARF

Faculty members Annemiek Harder and Mónica López López become board members of the European Scientific Association on Residential and Family Care for Children and Adolescents (EUSARF). EUSARF was born in the late eighties of the last century out of the collaboration between child welfare academics from several European universities. Currently, EUSARF has a board consisting of 20 academics from sixteen countries, including a board member from Israel and two board members from North America.

EUSARF organizes an international conference every two years. The next conference is titled ´Inspiring change: The impact of research on child and family welfare policy and practice´ and will take place in Warsaw, Poland (11-14 September, 2018). These conferences, with about 500 delegates, have become the place to be for academics in child welfare and related fields from all around the world to present and discuss their cutting-edge work.

Besides organizing scientific conferences, EUSARF intends to be a network, bringing together junior and senior academics in the field of child welfare and related fields from all around the world. As part of that effort, Mónica López López initiated the EUSARF PhD Academy in 2016, bringing together over 40 PhD students from various countries. A second EUSARF PhD Academy will be organized at the University of Groningen (21-25 August 2017), along with the Summer School ‘The Future of Child and Family Welfare Policy. Looking through Different Lenses’.

In EUSARF, Annemiek Harder will work at the publication of an open access, peer-reviewed interdisciplinary journal for research on child welfare, child protection and related fields. As concerns Mónica López López, amongst several research projects, she will stimulate the exchange of bachelor and master students by setting up an Erasmus Exchange network in the field of child welfare with the EUSARF board members and their universities.