Innovating New Frontiers for Child Welfare

800+FL

FLORIDA 2016-17

3,692 adoptions were finalized !!!

26% adopted by Foster Parents; 50% by Relatives; & 24% by Recruited Parents

30.87 months was the average length of stay in foster care for all children adopted

130 adoption dissruptions71 adoption dissolutions

Music

A data driven application designed to promote permanency and stability for children in foster care

through compatibility matching.

Disruption influenced by many sources

Child Impact Parent Impact Situation Impact

Behavioral Problems Warm Type of Placement (Kin)

Emotional Problems Child Oriented Family Support

Physical Problems Limit Setting System Integration (Family)

# of Placements Autonomy and Control Siblings Placed Together

Age Faith/Church Child/Social Worker Contact

Gender Parenting Ability

Motivation Flexibility

Socialization Commitment

Positivity Adequate Resources

History of Abuse/Neglect Marital Quality

Empirical evidence for matching

Positive Impact Evidence Negative Impact Evidence Potential to Test

Chemistry (undefined) Child Negative Mood with Mother’s Rigidity

Attachment Style

Child Shyness – Parent Attachment Sensitivity

Extraversion

Openness

Conscientiousness

Spirituality (older Children)

Interests (older Children)

We created a questionnaire to assess these qualities and have an initial algorithm that predicts the likelihood of disruption.

The matching system improves over time

Algorithm

Trained

Matches Made

Follow up Data

Collected

Algorithm revised

Benefits of Family-Match

For Families:• Visibility to workers across the state

• Reduced timeline

• Match based on compatibility

For Workers: • Simplified approach with less work to identify matched families

• Reduced timeline

• Presented compatible/approved families

What’s Happening Now: A Look at Virginia

Over 16,000Data Points Collected to Date.

“Love seeing all the families in one place.”

“It’s helpful to see the snapshot of information on each family prior to making contact with the family’s worker.”

“The delegate and secondary worker function makes our job easier.”

“So encouraging to see so many families who want to adopt an older child.”

“I am so hopeful our family will become visible to placement workers in Virginia! I really enjoyed the experience of putting together a profile to

spotlight our family.”

“I like how Family-Match considers our attributes along with the child’s attributes.”

Placement Workers

Families

About Our Families74 Approved Families

110 Total Families (pending home study approval)

34% will to adopt a child over the age of 10 in Virginia.

20% of our families with pets would consider parting with their pet if they had more information about a potential adoptive placement. When pressed further, these families made it clear that their desire to become parents trumped keeping a pet in the home.

70% of families surveyed who had a specified gender for a child preference said they would be willing to take a child of the gender not specified and 20% said they would consider it if they had more information.

Comparison ChartAdopt Us Kids Family-Match Heart Gallery

Family Recruitment X X X

State Specific Families Featured Only X

Capability for Social Worker to View Families X X

State One Children Featured X

Capability for Families to Search for Children X X

Families Nationwide X X

Matches Children to Families on Compatibility X

Home Study Sent to Social Worker Unsolicited X X

Home Studies Validated and Available X

Children Visible for Family Reviewing X X

Only Compatible Families Presented to Worker X

Match to Post Placement Process Followed X

Use of Machine Learning to Use Data from Match to Placement to Enhance Predictive Model

X