Volunteers accomplish this mission in a variety of ways. Of course, they make oral presentations to a judge at hearings and may even testify under oath in court. But, CASAs also speak for a child in writing, in the court reports they prepare for hearings held under Chapter 263 of the Texas Family Code. Although all CASAs are expected to prepare court reports for hearings in their cases, the Texas Family Code makes no specific reference to CASA court reports.
CASA court reports, on the other hand, focus on the lawsuit from the perspective of the children.
This focus on the children, by itself, makes the CASA court report significant to a judge. But, most helpful is a report that relates to the purpose of the hearing that the report is prepared for. The names of these hearings reflect both their function and the timing of the hearing. The status hearing is the second hearing in the case, the first one being the full adversary hearing held within 14 days after removal of the children from the family home. Occurring only about six weeks since that first court appearance, the status hearing provides a quick check on the status of how things are going in this lawsuit.