Register for an Aug. 25 webinar on Map2Impact.

Researcher Fred Wulczyn doesn’t have a crystal ball, but he believes a new initiative with Youth Villages may help child welfare leaders see a better future for their systems – and chart a course to get there.

The initiative — Map2Impact — is a strategic approach to using state administrative data to identify high-impact areas to expand proven services and drive systems change. Its goal is to stretch the meaning of “evidence based.”

“The Title IV-E Prevention Services Clearinghouse points to the best interventions, but the Clearinghouse does not tell states how to align an evidence-based intervention with a location or how to calculate the needed scale,” said Wulczyn, senior fellow at Chapin Hall and director of the Center for State Child Welfare Data.

Wulczyn and Youth Villages will co-lead a webinar on the initiative for child welfare leaders on Aug. 25. To register for the webinar, click here. Participants will hear about collaborative work using Map2Impact, ongoing in several states.

Wulczyn calls today’s child welfare leaders “stewards of the important systems that help children and families.” He challenges leaders to think about what better systems really mean.

“What would the impact be for children and families if effective investments were made using science?” he asks.

Some outcomes might include:

• Fewer substantiated child abuse and neglect reports
• Fewer children taken into foster care
• Shorter lengths of stays for children who do need out-of-home placement
• Better accountability for return on investments for elected officials

Alisha Pollastri, director of research at Youth Villages, said components of Map2Impact
include:

1. Geographic targeting for service expansion
   The Data Center analyzes existing state administrative data to produce state maps highlighting counties with disproportionately high placement rates or low exit rates, adjusted for population size, poverty and other demographic factors. This enables child welfare leaders to see which counties may have children in care who can be safe at home with the help of intensive, in-home support. These are counties where intensive family services, like Youth Villages’ Intercept program model, can have the greatest impact. Child welfare leaders can then collaborate with Youth Villages to expand services in these priority regions.
2. Five-year fiscal forecasting
   Using a decade of historical data, the Data Center can project child welfare admissions, exits and associated costs for each of the next five years under a business-as-usual scenario for a whole state or for smaller regions. The Five-Year Fiscal Forecast tool, accessed by state child welfare leaders as part of the Map2Impact approach, allows them to then model alternative scenarios and assess the financial implications of potential policy or programmatic changes. Once child welfare leaders have identified the future they would like to see, Youth Villages can support the jurisdiction in aligning interventions with their strategic and fiscal goals.
3. Evidence-based performance management
   The final component of the Map2Impact approach focuses on empowering state child welfare agencies to manage performance proactively. Using historical administrative data, the Data Center generates monthly forecasts of expected admissions and exits for a county based on established patterns and trends. New Allies, the consulting and technical assistance wing of Youth Villages, then works directly with state and local child welfare staff to translate these forecasts into actionable strategies by setting goals, planning interventions and monitoring progress with near real-time data.

Map2Impact brings together Data Center analysts and a cross-functional Youth Villages team—including research, strategy, operations, strategic partnerships and New Allies—to identify high-impact opportunities to expand proven services and drive systems change.

To register for the Map2Impact webinar, click here.

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