The longest running outcome evaluation system for children’s intensive services is getting a needed update.
In 1984, leaders in children’s services launched a first-of-its-kind innovation—a system to measure outcomes for children and youth receiving intensive mental health and foster care services. Since that time services for children and families have diversified as have the technologies and expectation for measuring and delivering outcomes.
Now, a generous gift from the Sauer Family Foundation is making a new build possible for the association of providers who began this innovative work in 1984. AspireMN, an association of resources and advocacy for children, youth, and families, is partnering with CEHD’s Education Technology Innovations (ETI) and Center for Advanced Studies in Child Welfare (CASCW) to redesign and launch a new system to measure and deliver outcomes to service leaders. The new system will track outcomes related to child wellbeing and have a technology platform that is accessible for service providers to use outcome data in ways that enhance services and practices for children and families.
“Access to outcome data that tracks meaningful change, results, and trends for individual children is an innovation that will continue to enhance the life-changing work of this field,” said AspireMN Executive Director Kirsten Anderson. “From its start in 1984, the delivery of outcome data, collected by service providers and analyzed by an external researcher, has significantly supported ongoing improvements in the field and has been of great value to policy maker and diverse stakeholders.”
ETI was established in 2015 to assure that the ground-breaking discoveries of CEHD faculty have a lasting societal impact. ETI works with faculty and staff across the college and University to make knowledge accessible by creating products that maintain the evidence-based understandings of the researchers’ findings.
Located in the School of Social Work, CASCW works to improve the well-being of children and families involved in the child welfare system through research, education, and outreach. In its nearly 30 years, CASCW has built an international reputation and leveraged millions of dollars in grant funds to improve the child welfare workforce and interdisciplinary child welfare practice. CASCW collaborates across disciplines with public, tribal, and private providers, as well as within the University, to advance knowledge through research and responsible use of data within the field of child welfare.
CASCW and ETI are a formidable team, also engaged with the Minnesota Department of Human Services’ Child Safety and Permanency Division to develop and launch a digital platform and presence for the newly formed Minnesota Child Welfare Workforce Collaborative and within it, the Minnesota Child Welfare Training Academy.
With the expertise delivered by ETI and CASCW and with community philanthropic support from the Sauer Family Foundation, AspireMN is certain the outcome evaluation system rebuild will yield tremendous benefits to the field, service providers, and most importantly – to children, youth, and families.
