Every child deserves a safe, loving and permanent home.
Fairfax CASAs show up, stand up, and speak up for their children.
Our Mission
The mission of Fairfax CASA is to advocate for the best interests of each abused and neglected child referred by the Fairfax County Juvenile & Domestic Relations District Court through the promotion and support of quality volunteer representation.
We seek to ensure that each child’s needs are identified and addressed with the goal of living in a safe and permanent home. As permitted by our legislative charter, we also provide assistance to youths entering adulthood who have been referred to the CASA program by the Court, up to the age of 21.
Our Vision
Our vision is of a world where every abused or neglected child is given the opportunity to thrive in a safe and loving home.
For over 35 years, Fairfax CASA, a nonprofit organization, has provided dedicated advocates to more than 8,500 abused and neglected children in our community. Fairfax CASA recruits, screens, trains, and professionally supervises skilled volunteers who serve as Court Appointed Special Advocates (CASAs). CASAs advocate for the needs of abused and neglected children in the court room, in the child welfare system, and beyond. CASAs become a consistent presence in the child’s life, offering stability and security. They also have the opportunity to build up families and promote healthy homes.
Fairfax CASA is the only child advocacy program for abused and neglected children in Fairfax County. It directly impacts the outcomes for our most vulnerable citizens, who are involved in our court and child welfare system, through no fault of their own. CASAs gather information about each child’s circumstances, focus on the safety and well-being of the child, and help keep the focus on the unique needs of the child. CASAs speak to caregivers, family members, and case professionals, visit regularly with the child, and review the child’s health, mental health, and school records.
CASAs work closely with the child’s social worker and the Guardian ad litem attorney appointed for the child. CASAs also collaborate with the professionals who provide case management, legal representation, and counseling services to help ensure the child remains safe and can be placed in a permanent home in a reasonable period of time. For each hearing, the CASAs write a detailed report to the Court, complete with case history, documented factual findings, and recommendations for family stabilization services and long term goals for the case.
In addition to Fairfax CASA’s court advocacy program, the organization works to promote and participate in collaborative efforts with other child-serving agencies on behalf of abuse and at-risk children and to raise community awareness about the long-term impact of child abuse and childhood trauma.
CASA is key to fulfilling society’s most fundamental obligation of ensuring those child victims of abuse and neglect can grow up in safe and nurturing homes where they can reach their full potential.
You can be a CASA! If you want to help children and can dedicate around 15-20 hours per month, we can provide the rest! Your donations can help us assign a CASA for each child referred by the court. It costs over $200 to train a volunteer and approximately $2,000 to serve a child for a full year. Please use the button below to make a donation using your credit card. You will receive an email confirmation and a letter of thanks by postal mail.
How We Accomplish Our Mission
We are there for the child
Whatever their age, children removed from their home because of abuse or neglect face a frightening unknown. We make sure they don’t face it alone. We stand by them. We are there whenever they need us, for as long as it takes to ensure safety and permanency.
CASAs are dedicated, compassionate adults who provide a consistent presence, who care, who listen, and who put the child’s interests before all others.
CASAs speak for a child when they cannot speak for themselves. CASAs help children heal and thrive. CASAs give children the support they need to better their outcomes. CASAs help children find the road home, no matter how long the journey.
We are there for the judge
Judges are tasked with making incredibly difficult decisions that affect the lives of children, parents, and families. In order to make informed decisions, judges need to know the child and the facts of the case. CASAs provide the court with up-to-date, impartial, and factual information that assists the judge in their decision making.
We take the time to get to know the child at the heart of each case. We go where they go. We talk to the people who touch their lives—parents and foster parents, family members, teachers, doctors, neighbors, friends, social workers, attorneys, and therapists. We gather the details only a dedicated volunteer with a caseload of one can deliver.
Every visit, call, and report we make gives judges what they need to act in the best interests of the child. Every detail helps judges move the child out of the system and into a permanent home.
We are there to change lives
Children with a CASA receive immediate attention, more specialized services, and achieve better outcomes than their peers in the child welfare system without a CASA. CASAs take part in their children's IEP and disciplinary meetings within the schools, ensuring they have a dedicated voice at the table. Children with a CASA experience fewer placement changes and spend less time in the foster care system than their peers without a CASA.
Fairfax CASAs are committed. They stay on their cases from beginning to end, for an average of 26 months. Our longest running case lasted over ten years, with the same CASA assigned from day one until the case closed. That CASA saw their child through 32 different foster placements over the course of ten years, visiting the child at every single one, up and down the east coast. Now an adult, that child remains in contact with their CASA, utilizing them as a resource to this day.