A Checklist for the Examination of Cultural Competence in Social Service Agencies

Abstract

Multicultural services are being provided by social service agencies in the absence ofany clearly identified criteria for culturally competent practice. This article describes the development of a checklist of agency characteristics that are believed to represent cultural competence. The checklist content was derived by sampling articles from a compilation of relevant literature. This literature described existing services for minority groups and provided case examples of specific programs. Systematic procedures were used to select articles, abstract characteristics from these articles, and cluster these characteristics. A preliminary form of the checklist contains items related to agency practices, available services, relationship to ethnic community, training, and evaluation. Pilot applications in social service programs provided evidence for observer reliability and concurrent validity. A discussion suggested some needed revisions in this checklist and provided a context for the implied checklist definition of cultural competency.