The Need for Self-Evaluation (Summary)

Family to Family Initiative

Designed in 1992, the Annie E. Casey Foundation’s Family to Family Initiative champions a family-centered, data-driven approach to foster care reform.

Analytical Tools

Four analytical tools — longitudinal databases, population profiles, statistical forecasting and desktop mapping — can help child welfare groups make better decisions and improve their capacity to measure progress.

Early Efforts

The self-evaluation tool promotes an early effort to establish a strong statistical baseline that will serve as a starting point for tomorrow’s data-driven decisions.

Mining Information

One easy way for child welfare groups to supplement their current database is to mine information routinely gathered by other local family- and child-focused organizations.

Deeper Analysis

The self-evaluation tool encourages child welfare advocates to look beyond each individual child or provider and instead analyze events (total children entering foster care, for example) within a specific time frame.