Child welfare systems operated by states, territories and tribes around the national provide services to:
- Prevent child maltreatment;
- Respond to reports of abuse and neglect;
- Support children who must be temporarily separated from parents or other caretakers because of safety concerns;
- Reunify families who have been separated;
- Achieve and sustain permanency for children and youth in out of home care – with their biological families when possible and with others when it is not;
- Support youth who age out of care without having achieved permanency.
ASPE conducts work on policy and cross-cutting topics related to child welfare, such as understanding the behavioral health needs of children in foster care, describing intersections between child welfare and other social and health issues such as parental substance use, mental illness, and interpersonal violence; building state capacity to prevent involvement with the child welfare system; understanding variations in performance and outcomes across states; and linking child welfare data systems with other health and human services data.
Related Products:
- Building Successful Data Linking Teams for Child Welfare and Medicaid Agencies: Lessons Learned from the Child Welfare and Health Infrastructure for Linking and Data Analysis of Resources, Effectiveness, and Needs (CHILDREN) Initiative
- Integrating Services to Strengthen Children, Youth, and Families and Prevent Involvement in the Child Welfare System
- Behavioral Health Treatment by Service Type and Race and Ethnicity for Children and Youth Involved with the Child Welfare System
- Final Report: Child and Caregiver Outcomes Using Linked Data
- Behavioral Health Diagnoses and Treatment Services for Children Involved with the Child Welfare System
- Planning Title IV-E Prevention Services Toolkit