 To: ACBHD All Providers From: Laphonsa Gibbs, Director, ACBHD Child and Young Adult System of Care Memo Highlights: Effective October 6, 2025, under your contract, the Child and Adolescent Needs and Strengths (CANS) requirements will change. Only the IP-CANS questions will be required as part of the transition toward implementing a “One CANS per youth” model for ages 6-21 years. The CANS must be completed by the mental health provider at intake, every 6 months, at discharge, and annually. ... ... ACBHD will require completion of the IP-CANS. At the same time, we recognize that individual agencies may choose the approach that best fits their practice. Agencies may continue encouraging staff to complete the full Alameda Birth-24 CANS version, or they may decide to focus on completing only the IP-CANS items. Our goal is to provide flexibility while ensuring consistency on required elements. ... See memo for more details including Data Entry of CANS and PSC-35- CHANGES TO OA. Please contact Jessica Vigil if you have any questions related to CANS or Objective Arts navigation support at [email protected]. Attachments • IP-CANS Rating Sheet- English | Spanish (pdf) (other threshold languages will be coming soon) • IP-CANS Manual English (other threshold languages will be coming soon)  >>> Specific to the Alameda Birth-24 CANS (not included in the IP-CANS):
All Extension Modules:
0 Comments
 As the school year begins, it’s the perfect time to reflect on how we can best support children and youth in their academic journeys. In this installment of the Lotería and the CANS series, we’ll explore La Campana (The Bell) and its connection to the school-related items in the CANS. Just as the bell signals the start to the school day, it also represents opportunities for growth, connection, learning, and perhaps even triggers–both for students and for those working alongside them. For more information on using Lotería cards with other CANS items, such as strengths and family, visit our previous posts and newsletters for further details. The CANS includes several school-related items, such as school behavior, achievement, and attendance. These areas are critical to shaping a child’s overall well-being, and La Campana offers a creative way to explore them during assessments.  Applying the Concept in Practice When assessing school-related needs, La Campana can serve as a visual reminder to listen for the unique “ring” of each child’s experience. For example:
Some questions clinicians can ask clients and families to better understand these experiences are:
The responses to these questions can then lead to collaborative conversations around CANS needs ratings. By focusing on both strengths and challenges from their responses and ratings, we can help children and families navigate the complexities of the school environment with greater resilience and success. Using La Campana (The Bell) as a Supervision Tool La Campana (The Bell) can evoke many interpretations–some positive, such as excitement for learning, and some more challenging, like the stress of high expectations or other triggers. The CANS is an amazing tool that can be brought into supervision to further deepen discussions. La Campana can be used as a metaphor to spark reflection on how school environments impact a child’s strengths and needs. Consider posing the following questions to a supervisee:
These prompts can lead to rich discussions about school-related CANS items and how we approach them in a collaborative, strengths-based way. Looking Ahead As the school year progresses, La Campana reminds us to celebrate even the small victories: a child’s improved attendance, a parent-teacher partnership, or a student feeling more confident in their abilities. These moments resonate far beyond the classroom, creating a ripple effect of growth and empowerment. We would love to hear your experiences and/or questions about using Lotería cards during your CANS assessments and using them in schools. Feel free to contact us here: In future posts, we’ll continue to explore Lotería cards and their connections to CANS, weaving cultural creativity into meaningful conversations about strengths, needs, and collaboration. Until then, let’s keep listening for the bells that signal progress in our work with children, youth, and families. Here’s to a school year filled with opportunity, resilience, and connection–one ring at a time!!  If you’ve come to live online CANS certification training, you might remember that a foundational characteristic of the CANS is that culture should be considered throughout every domain and item. There are, however, specific items related to culture and these items are found both in strengths and needs domains.  In the strengths domain, we have the cultural identity and spiritual/religious items to rate. These items can capture the powerful positive impact that belonging to a specific cultural group or having a specific religious identity/spiritual belief or community can have on a child, youth, or family. The cultural identity strengths item is inclusive of factors such as race, religion, ethnicity, geography, and sexual orientation or gender identity and expression. It is imperative that we understand how clients and their families self-identify, and if their identity creates a sense of inclusion and/or pride for them that might indicate a centerpiece strength or if we have something to build on. On the needs side, our Alameda County CANS has the Cultural Factors needs domain with four items to capture any needs related to language, traditions and rituals, cultural stress, and cultural differences within the family. This domain highlights our county’s acknowledgement of the very real negative impacts systemic racism and oppression can have on our children, youth and families. The more we understand our clients and their lived experiences, the more we can support them to build resilience and connect to resources to strengthen their cultural identities and connections and reduce culturally-related needs.  Alameda Birth-24 CANS  CA IP-CANS Did you know that you need to recertify your CANS certificate every year? The process is simple. Take a look! 
  Q1: My agency uses Objective Arts (OA) for direct CANS entry. What are some helpful reports to look at client progress and needs over time? A1: Several reports can be accessed using OA, such as Tickler with Episodes, Impact Report, TCOM Caseload Progress, and others. To make the most of the reports based on your caseload, the most informative one for you would be the Items Impact Report. This report, which your agency can extract directly from OA, provides a comprehensive overview from intake to present. From this report, you can see actionable items for a caseload as well as the percentage of resolved items. In this report, your agency can also identify items where programs are making the biggest impact on client needs, as well as areas of improvement for providers. If you or someone at your agency would like additional information on pulling reports and OA data, you can learn more through the Objective Arts Key Reports Manual found HERE. You can also access the PowerPoint slides that highlight report use and parameters. Q2: I need support grounding myself in the ratings. Sometimes the ratings feel like they are flipped in my mind when going from NEEDS to STRENGTHS and back again. A2: When rating a NEED, 0 indicates no need. When rating a STRENGTH, 3 indicates no strength. This may feel flipped or like opposites for many users of the CANS/ANSA. A different way to reorient yourself to the ratings is to tie them to your potential action level as a provider, as this does not change regardless of whether the item is a need or a strength. When looking at the Needs, 0 means zero action is needed. A 1 rating is an item to keep an eye on while you gather more information or determine if it’s something that could benefit from an intervention. A 2 rating requires you to intervene, but you have time to develop and provide interventions. A 3 rating represents a worst-case scenario, and an immediate need for you to do safety planning, going over and above the baseline intervention. When looking at STRENGTHS, a 0 rating means no action is required, as this is something the client has a handle on and can use independently. A1 rating indicates a strength that is there, and it can be useful for you to know it exists. The 2 and 3 identify an actionable item IF the client WANTED to further develop this strength. A 2 rating for strengths is something that could benefit from an intervention to build it (if the client wanted). A rating of 3 in strengths means that extensive support would be needed, as you would be starting from scratch (if the client wanted to work to develop that strength). We also like to use this iceberg visual to help solidify actionable ratings regarding both needs and strengths domain items:  You can also find additional tips and tricks on our Alameda TCOM Collaborative website such as a CANS Rating Windowpane-Scoring Guide, Q3: I need help with really understanding and grounding myself on how to separate a rating of 2 from a rating of 3 in looking at NEEDS. A3: You have identified an actionable needs item for your client. How do you determine the amount of support to provide? There are a few ways to identify the level of support necessary to aid in healthy development. One way is to go back to your CANS/ANSA manual and look at the anchor text for the item. Which of these descriptions—a 2 or a 3— best fits the level of negative impact the client is experiencing? If you're still unsure, you can ask, "Does the client have time for the provider to provide an intervention over time?" If so, a rating of 2 may be appropriate. If time is critical, a 3 may be most fitting, as this item may indicate a severe, dangerous, or disabling level of functioning. Think about the worst-case scenario. It's also important to consider the principle of masking: Is there an intervention (short or long term) that is helping this need appear less severe? Interventions might include medications supporting symptom stabilization or a residential facility that limits access to potentially dangerous situations. If these interventions were removed, would the client’s level of risk increase? And to what degree?
  CANS Manual  |
|
RSS Feed
