A referral packet can tell you a lot about why a client is sitting across from you. It can't tell you who she is.
That gap is what makes some intake questions on the ASWB exam harder than they look. Picture this one: child protective services refers a 35-year-old woman to your agency. Her children were removed from her care after CPS found evidence that her boyfriend was sexually abusing them. You're meeting her for the initial assessment. What do you do with everything CPS sent you?
There are three tempting mistakes. You can set the file aside and pretend you're starting fresh. You can open with it and ask her to account for what happened. Or you can let it quietly write your assessment before she's said a word. Each one fails for a different reason, and working out why is most of what you need to know about intake.
The first meeting has a few jobs at once. You're engaging the client, gathering enough information to understand the situation, explaining what you do and what the limits of confidentiality are, and starting to agree on what the work will be. None of that is intervention yet. If an answer option has you teaching parenting skills or setting a reunification plan in the first session, it's probably skipping ahead. The post on assessment vs. intervention walks through that sequencing in more detail.
Referral information feeds the assessment. It doesn't replace it.
What CPS sends you is collateral information, and collateral information is valuable. It tells you what the agency found, what it's concerned about, and often what it expects from services. Reviewing it before the first session is good preparation. Ignoring it would be poor practice. You'd miss safety issues, and you'd be working blind on the very thing that brought the client to you.
But it's one account. It was written for CPS's purposes, it reflects what CPS knew at the time, and it doesn't include the client's understanding of her own life. Did she know about the abuse? Is she still with the boyfriend? Is she afraid of him? Has she been harmed too? The file may hint at some of this. It won't settle it.
So the file shapes what you ask about. The client's own account is still something you have to go get.
The strongest intake move here is also the plainest one: let her know you've received information from CPS, describe it in general terms, and ask how she understands what happened.
Something like, "CPS sent me some information about why your children were placed. Before anything else, I'd like to hear from you how you see what happened and what's been going on since."
That does several things. It's honest, which matters because a client who later discovers you knew more than you let on has a good reason to stop trusting you. It shows her the referral isn't a secret file being used against her. And it invites her story instead of demanding a defense.
That's the answer to the CPS question. The social worker uses the referral information as background that guides the assessment, is open with the client about having it, and explores her perspective. The information informs the intake without deciding it.
Compare that with the confrontational version, where the social worker asks why she didn't protect her children. That's a judgment dressed as a question. It puts her on trial in the first ten minutes and is likely to produce guarded, minimal answers. On the exam, answer options that confront, accuse, or moralize at intake are rarely right.
Sometimes it won't. She may say she had no idea about the abuse, or describe events differently than CPS did. The temptation is to correct her, or to decide which version is true.
Neither is your job at intake. CPS investigates and makes findings. Your role is to understand her, and a discrepancy is useful information about how she sees things, not a contradiction to resolve on the spot. Explore it with curiosity: "The report describes it a little differently. Help me understand how it looked from where you were." Then document her account as hers and the referral's account as the referral's, without blending the two into a single version of events.
If an answer option has the social worker acting as investigator, gathering evidence, or trying to establish what really happened, it's usually outside the role.
This woman may not be here entirely by choice. If services are part of a CPS case plan, getting her children back may depend on showing up, and even without a court order that kind of pressure changes the engagement work.
Acknowledging the pressure she's under usually helps more than working around it. Asking how she feels about being referred, what she's been told she needs to do, and what she wants out of this gives her some footing. Self-determination under NASW Code of Ethics standard 1.02 still applies, within whatever limits a case plan sets. There are real choices she can make about goals, pacing, and what she focuses on, and naming them matters.
It's also worth being clear about who the client is. CPS made the referral and may receive reports, but the woman in the room is your client. The post on figuring out who the client is covers how that plays out when a third party is involved.
With a CPS referral, confidentiality has limits, and she needs to know them at the start. She also needs to know what your role is. You aren't CPS, but you may be reporting to them, and a client who can't tell the difference will reasonably treat you as an extension of the agency that took her children. What will you share with CPS? Under what circumstances? What will she be asked to sign, and what happens if she doesn't?
Informed consent under standard 1.03 and confidentiality under 1.07 both point the same way: explain these limits before she discloses, not after. That includes your ongoing obligations as a mandated reporter. If she tells you something new about the children's safety, she should already know what you'll have to do with it.
Getting releases of information signed is part of this. Sharing details back to CPS should rest on her consent or a legal requirement, not on the assumption that the referral source is entitled to everything.
A good intake with this client goes well past the incident in the referral. Her relationship with the boyfriend, and whether it's ongoing, bears directly on her ability to protect her children and on her own safety. Some parents in her position have been abused by the same partner, and that needs to be assessed rather than assumed either way.
She's also just lost her children, at least for now. Grief, shame, anger, depression, and suicide risk all belong in the assessment. So do her supports, her strengths, her own history, and what she wants. Reunification may be her goal, and understanding that goal is part of understanding her.
This is where the referral file earns its place. It points you toward the questions that matter. Her answers are what make up the assessment.
Cases involving the sexual abuse of children stir strong feelings, and it's easy to walk into the room already angry at a parent who didn't stop it. That reaction is normal. Letting it drive the session isn't.
If you notice judgment shaping your questions or your tone, that's a signal to bring the case to supervision, not a reason to skip the client's perspective. On the exam, the social worker who seeks supervision for a strong personal reaction is making a sound choice. The one who acts on the reaction usually isn't.
A social worker at a family service agency receives a referral from a probation officer for a 28-year-old man convicted of driving under the influence. The referral notes that he "minimizes his drinking." At the first session, the man says he's only there because the judge ordered it. What should the social worker do FIRST?
A. Acknowledge his frustration and explore his understanding of what led to the referral
B. Share the probation officer's concern about minimization and ask him to respond
C. Explain the consequences of not completing court-ordered services
Option C isn't wrong information to cover eventually, but leading with consequences frames the relationship around compliance and tells him his frustration doesn't matter. Option B uses the referral as a confrontation before any engagement has happened, which is likely to make him more defensive, not less. Option A meets him where he is, recognizes that he's an involuntary client, and invites his own account, which is exactly what an intake needs before anything else.
The answer is A.
Intake questions look simple until the referral carries something heavy. Then confronting, ignoring, or prejudging the client can start to look like reasonable options. The steady approach holds up across settings: review what you've been sent, be open with the client about it, explain your role and the limits of confidentiality, and let her tell her side before drawing conclusions.
The best way to make that instinct automatic is to see it tested across a lot of different scenarios. Spot your weak areas with a realistic practice exam and see how you handle intake questions when the referral makes the case feel decided.
Right now, get SWTP's online practice exams at a reduced price. Just $39. Get additional savings when buying more than one exam at a time-- less than $30 per exam!
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