Achieving Positive Outcomes for Children
The Child Welfare Outcomes 1999: Annual Report ,is the second in a series of annual reports from the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (the Department). This report, prepared in accordance with section 203(a) of the Adoption and Safe Families Act (ASFA) of 1997 (provided in Appendix A), presents data pertaining to the performance of States with respect to a national set of child welfare outcomes. Developed by the Department in consultation with State child welfare agency representatives and other experts in the field, the outcomes reflect widely accepted performance objectives for child welfare practice. The outcomes are:
• Reduce recurrence of child abuse and/or neglect,
• Reduce the incidence of child abuse and/or neglect in
foster care,
• Increase permanency for children in foster care,
• Reduce time in foster care to reunification without
increasing re-entry,
• Reduce time in foster care to adoption,
• Increase placement stability, and
• Reduce placements of young children in group homes or
institutions.
The series of annual reports on child welfare outcomes (Child Welfare Outcomes Annual Reports) is central to the Department’s comprehensive approach to attaining the goals of safety, permanency, and well-being for all children who come into contact with public child welfare systems. The Department’s approach promotes practices and policies at the Federal and State levels to ensure that children who are victims of maltreatment are kept safe from future harm, children who enter foster care are returned to their families or placed with appropriate permanent families as quickly as possible, and children in foster care receive the supports and services necessary for positive growth and development.
To reach these goals, the Department has developed several initiatives, each of which supports attainment of the national set of child welfare outcomes. Two initiatives involve assessing and tracking State child welfare system performance relevant to outcomes for children and families and identifying areas where improvements are needed. Other initiatives provide training and technical assistance to State child welfare systems to make the improvements necessary to attain desired outcomes. A third set of initiatives consists of research and demonstration efforts designed to increase knowledge regarding the child welfare services, practices, and approaches that promote child safety, permanency, and well-being. Additional initiatives promote collaboration between State and local child welfare systems and relevant systems such as law enforcement, juvenile and family courts, health, and mental health. The purpose of these initiatives is to enhance the development of joint efforts aimed at achieving safety, permanency, and well-being for all children. This chapter provides a discussion of how these initiatives are related to the Child Welfare Outcomes Annual Reports and how they contribute to achieving the Department ’s goals of child safety, permanency, and well-being.
Assessing and Tracking State Child Welfare
Agency Performance
The Department’s initiatives designed to assess and track the performance of State child welfare agencies are the Child Welfare Outcomes Annual Reports and the Child and Family Service (CFS) reviews. These efforts reflect the focus of the U.S. Congress and the Department on outcomes for children and families and on establishing accountability from public child welfare agencies for achieving those outcomes.
Data to support these initiatives come from the Adoption and Foster Care Analysis and Reporting System (AFCARS) and the National Child Abuse and Neglect Data System (NCANDS). AFCARS and NCANDS represent Federal efforts to collect and disseminate comprehensive and consistent national information pertaining to child welfare. NCANDS data are used to prepare national and State portraits of child maltreatment and child protective services that are published annually. Highlights from the most recent publication, Child Maltreatment 1999: 10 Years of Reporting, are presented in Appendix B of this report.
The Department uses AFCARS data to prepare both 6-month and annual summaries of information pertaining to children in foster care (from the AFCARS Foster Care Database) and children who are adopted (from the AFCARS Adoption Database). Reports using AFCARS data are available on the Department’s Web site (http://www.acf.hhs.gov/programs/cb/dis/afcars/cwstats.html). The 1999 AFCARS Report (Report # 6) is provided in Appendix C. AFCARS and NCANDS data also are used for the outcome measures and context information presented in the Child Welfare Outcomes Annual Reports and for many of the CFS review statewide data indicators.
The Child Welfare Outcomes Annual Reports use NCANDS and AFCARS data to provide information about the performance of State child welfare systems on 12 measures that assess attainment of the 7 national child welfare outcomes. (See Appendix D for the list of national outcomes and measures.) The reports also present data on several context variables relevant to each State’s child welfare system to enhance interpretation of outcome data. For example, data for each State are provided for the number of children under age 18, the percentage of children living in poverty, the number of maltreatment victims, the numbers of children entering and exiting foster care in a given year, and the number of children adopted. Data also are provided on the age and race/ethnicity of maltreatment victims, children in foster care, and children who have been adopted through the public child welfare system.
Because the reports are published annually, they permit an observation of trends in performance over time. However, for the first few annual reports, changes in data over time must be interpreted cautiously because they may reflect changes in data quality rather than in State child welfare system performance. As data for the outcome measures continue to improve in quality, changes in data from one year to the next can be interpreted with greater confidence.
Although the Child Welfare Outcomes Annual Reports allow the Department to track State child welfare agency performance on key outcome measures, the data by themselves do not permit a comprehensive understanding and assessment of State child welfare agency operations or the changes that may be needed to improve outcomes for children and families. This is the role of the Department’s CFS reviews, which were developed in response to the Omnibus Budget Reconciliation Act of 1993 (Public Law 103-66). Public Law 103-66 authorized the Department to review State child and family service programs in order to assess compliance with the State plan requirements set forth in titles IV-B and IV-E of the Social Security Act (the Act).
The CFS reviews are designed to assist States in assessing and improving their child welfare service systems through the identification of their strengths and needs. The reviews examine the functioning of a State’s entire child welfare system by collecting and analyzing information across the range of funding streams and programs that States have in place. The goal is to identify the results that State child welfare systems are achieving for children and families in the areas of safety, permanency, and well-being, and the elements that promote the attainment of desired results.
To establish a structure for assessing State performance under the CFS review process, the Department selected six outcome measures from those included in the Child Welfare Outcomes Annual Reports and developed national standards for these measures. Appendix E presents the Department’s Information Memorandum (IM) regarding the standards and the basis for their calculation. The criteria for determining a State’s substantial conformity under titles IV-B and IV-E of the Act through the CFS reviews include the State’s performance on these six outcome measures relative to the national standards, along with information collected from case record reviews, stakeholder interviews, and other sources that the State provides. The selected outcome measures for which national standards were established are as follows:
• Outcome measure: Recurrence of maltreatment
(1.1)
Standard: Of all children who were victims of
substantiated or indicated child abuse and/or neglect during the
first 6 months of the period under review, 6.1
percent or fewer children had another substantiated or
indicated report within 6 months.
• Outcome measure: Maltreatment in foster care
(2.1)
Standard: Of all children in foster care in the
State during the period under review, 0.57
percent or fewer were the subject of substantiated or
indicated maltreatment by a foster parent or facility staff
member.
•Outcome measure: Time to reunification
(4.1)
Standard: Of all children who were reunified with
their parents or caretakers at the time of discharge from foster
care, 76.2 percent or more were reunified
in fewer than 12 months from the time of latest removal from the
home.
• Outcome measure: Children re-entering foster
care (4.2)
Standard: Of all children who entered foster care
during the year under review, 8.6 percent or
fewer re-entered foster care within 12 months of a prior
foster care
episode.
• Outcome measure: Time to adoption (5.1)
Standard: Of all children who exited foster care to
a finalized adoption during the year under review, 32 percent or more exited foster care in fewer than
24 months from the time of the latest removal from the
home.
• Outcome measure: Placement stability
(6.1)
Standard: Of all children who have been in foster
care for less than 12 months from the time of the latest removal
from the home, 86.7 percent or more have
had no more than two placement
settings.
The first 17 CFS reviews will take place in fiscal year (FY) 2001. Additional information about the schedule for CFS reviews is available in Appendix F. As information from the reviews becomes available, relevant findings will be incorporated into the Child Welfare Outcomes Annual Reports to enhance interpretation of data and, where possible, provide explanations for a State’s high or low performance on the outcome measures, as required in Section 203(a) of ASFA.
Training and Technical Assistance
Initiatives
The Department’s efforts to ensure the safety, permanency,
and well-being of all children served by child welfare systems are
supported by its training and technical assistance (T/TA) network,
described in
Appendix G. Three of the Department’s T/TA initiatives
focus on improving the quality of data reported to NCANDS and
AFCARS. High-quality data are critical to a meaningful assessment
of the success of State child welfare systems in attaining desired
outcomes for children. The Department contracts with a private firm
to provide technical assistance to States regarding the reporting
of data to NCANDS and to collect and analyze NCANDS data. The
National Resource Center for Information Technology in Child
Welfare provides assistance to States in collecting and reporting
their data to AFCARS. Technical assistance to States pertaining to
AFCARS also is provided as part of the Department’s periodic
AFCARS reviews.
Other Department initiatives assist State, local, and tribal child welfare agencies in improving child outcomes by providing T/TA in establishing effective policies and practices. For example,
• States seeking to improve their efforts to achieve permanency for children in a timely manner can access the National Resource Center for Foster Care and Permanency Planning.
• States interested in reducing the recurrence of substantiated child maltreatment can obtain T/TA from the National Resource Center on Child Maltreatment regarding effective risk assessment tools and procedures, or from the National Child Welfare Resource Center on Family-Centered Practice for information on effective family preservation and support services.
• Technical assistance relevant to increasing and supporting adoptions is available from the National Resource Center on Special Needs Adoptions.
In addition, assistance on a wide range of topics is offered by two child welfare-related clearinghouses operated by the Department– the National Clearinghouse on Child Abuse and Neglect Information and the National Adoption Information Clearinghouse.
The Department also operates the Child Welfare Training Program, a discretionary grant program that awards funds to institutions of higher learning to implement training efforts for personnel who work (or plan to work) in the child welfare field. In FY 1999, a cluster of grants was awarded for training child welfare personnel to develop child-focused intervention skills. Training grants funded in FY 1998 support efforts to train child welfare personnel in practices designed to prevent the recurrence of child abuse and neglect and re-entries into foster care. This focus reflects two of the national outcome measures included in the Child Welfare Outcomes Annual Reports.
Increasing Knowledge Regarding Effective
Practices
The assistance provided to States by the Department’s T/TA
network reflects state-of-the-art, evidence-based knowledge
regarding effective child welfare practices and approaches. This
knowledge is derived from current research on child welfare
including evaluations of child welfare programs, policies, and
service models. The Department supports the proliferation of
evidence-based knowledge through a variety of programs administered
by the Children’s Bureau. One program is the title IV-E
Child Welfare Waiver Demonstration Program, authorized under
section 1130 of the Act, which was amended by ASFA. The statute
gives the Department the authority to grant waivers from certain
requirements of titles IV-B and IV-E of the Act to up to 10 States
each year. An interested State submits an application to the
Department requesting a waiver of these requirements in order to
implement an intervention or a service delivery approach that is
expected to be cost-neutral and produce positive outcomes for
children and families. If the Department approves the application,
the State can implement the initiative for up to 5 years. States
approved for a waiver are required to conduct a methodologically
rigorous evaluation to test the effectiveness of their model. This
requirement is intended to ensure that evaluation information will
be a useful resource for the field and for future development of
innovative State and Federal child welfare policies and practices.
Currently, 19 States and the District of Columbia participate in
the Child Welfare Waiver Demonstration Program, with some States
implementing more than one
project.
The Department also supports the development of evidence-based knowledge about effective child welfare practices and policies through the Adoption Opportunities Program (AOP). This program, authorized by the Child Abuse Prevention and Treatment and Adoption Reform Act of 1978, awards grants to public and private non-profit agencies and organizations in an effort to (1) eliminate jurisdictional and legal obstacles to adoption, (2) promote quality standards for all adoption-related services, and (3) demonstrate expeditious ways to free children for adoption when adoption has been determined to be the most appropriate case goal. The most recent AOP funding initiative stressed the importance of evaluation and directed applicants to assess outcomes that are consistent with the national child welfare outcomes whenever possible. Information relevant to improving child welfare practices also is provided by the Department’s Abandoned Infants Demonstration Program initiative and by various initiatives funded under the Child Abuse Prevention and Treatment Act (CAPTA).
To enhance knowledge about the children and families served by child welfare systems, the Department funds several basic research efforts. One recent Department-funded research project is the National Survey of Child and Adolescent Well-Being (authorized under the Personal Responsibility and Work Opportunity Reconciliation Act of 1996, section 429A [Public Law 104-193]). This research effort is designed to generate information on the characteristics of children and families who come into contact with child welfare systems, the pathways and services that these children and families experience, and their short- and longer-term outcomes. The study findings are expected to provide information that child welfare systems can use to improve their services and policies with respect to attaining the goals of child safety, permanency, and well-being.
Developing Collaborations with Other
Systems
The ability of a State child welfare system to attain outcomes
related to child safety, permanency, and well-being is
significantly affected by the functioning of many other State and
local service systems. Child welfare systems are dependent upon the
operations of juvenile or family courts, juvenile justice systems,
law enforcement agencies, health and mental health service systems,
and substance abuse treatment systems. Even public agencies
responsible for housing have an impact on child welfare operations
because the availability of safe housing for low-income families
often affects whether children can be maintained safely in their
homes.
The Department operates numerous initiatives designed to promote collaboration between child welfare and other relevant systems. As part of the Department’s T/TA network, the National Child Welfare Resource Center on Family-Centered Practice provides assistance to State child welfare agencies in forging the collaborations necessary to ensure optimal services to families that come into contact with the child welfare system. The National Resource Center for Organizational Improvement assists State child welfare agencies in developing plans for collaborating with other State and community agencies in preparation for the CFS reviews. In addition, the Court Improvement Program, a demonstration initiative authorized under the Omnibus Budget Reconciliation Act of 1993 (Public Law 103-66) and re-authorized by ASFA for FYs 1999-2001, is intended to decrease the recurrence of maltreatment and expedite permanency for all children in foster care by encouraging the courts, child welfare agencies, and other relevant parties to develop and implement a joint agenda for change.
The Department itself collaborates with other Federal agencies to support State and local level collaboration. For example, the Department collaborates with the U.S. Department of Justice to fund projects that focus on the co-occurrence of domestic violence and child maltreatment to enhance the safety and well-being of battered women and their children. The Department also has established an interagency agreement with the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration to support implementation of the Department ’s recommendations pertaining to child protection and substance abuse, and with the Center for Mental Health Services to support child welfare activities conducted by the center’s TA providers.
The Child Welfare Outcomes 1999 Annual
Report
Although the various departmental initiatives discussed in this
chapter are funded under different programs and congressional acts,
and were implemented at different times over the past decade, they
have come together as integral parts of the Department’s
comprehensive approach to achieving the outcomes of child safety,
permanency, and well-being for all children served by the Nation
’s child welfare systems. The Child Welfare Outcomes Annual
Reports are at the core of this approach because they permit an
assessment of whether child welfare systems are achieving success
with respect to these
outcomes.
The Child Welfare Outcomes 1999: Annual Report presents data for 1998 and 1999 on the performance of individual State child welfare systems with respect to the existing set of national outcomes pertaining to child safety and permanency, and information on some key contextual factors relevant to understanding performance on the outcomes. Chapter II provides a discussion of the current report, how it differs from the prior report, and plans for future reports. In Chapter III, the key findings and implications of these findings for assessing State performance are explored. Chapter IV provides the child welfare context and outcome data for each State.
