The Iowa Department of Health and Human Services (IDHHS) has partnered with the Administration for Children and Families (ACF) — a division of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) — as part of ACF’s newly launched Child Welfare Technology Incubator. The incubator is ACF’s effort to more closely support states as they develop technology systems to manage foster care and other operations. The systems, known as Comprehensive Child Welfare Information Systems (CCWIS), are partially funded and approved by ACF.
Iowa is currently involved in developing and implementing its new CCWIS, known as VISION.
“We share ACF’s expectation that IT solutions can be built more quickly, more cost effective, and designed with the needs of the social workers at the center of the work,” Danielle Sample, IDHHS director of communications for external relations, said via email. “Based on our novel approach to designing the system prior to bringing on an IT vendor, ACF has collaborated with Iowa to expedite the approvals needed to authorize VISION.”
The VISION platform “will give workers a clearer, more streamlined view of each case by organizing all individuals, services and activities in one place and reducing time spent on paperwork,” Sample said, adding guided workflows will improve and support case management.
“The platform will also securely connect with key partner systems across areas such as education, courts, health and other services, helping workers access important information more easily and coordinate support for children and families,” she said.
Developing an effective child welfare information system is often not a technical challenge — there is no shortage of vendors anxious to land a state technology contract — but one involving process and planning, ACF officials said.
Too often, said Cody Inman, delegated commissioner for the Administration on Children, Youth, and Families, states struggle in the planning of a large, multiyear technology project that can involve multiple agencies and numerous data sources.
“States typically will put out an RFP, and say, we want to do W, Y and Z. But they’re so focused on getting the actual technology system procured that they ignore the readiness, and the actual system preparation,” Inman said. “We want to change it.”
ACF would like to collaborate with states early and often to make planning more manageable so they can implement efficiently down the road.
“We don’t see the technology as the issue. There’s plenty of tech companies out there that can solve this problem,” Inman said. “What we see as the problem is the planning, the readiness, the implementation factors leading up to that.”
The incubator process is seen as a way to work more closely and collaboratively with states, nudging them toward best practices — particularly in areas like data management — and understanding federal regulations, Inman said.
Officials in Washington, D.C., point to the Nov. 13 presidential executive order (EO) Fostering the Future for American Children and Families, which promotes modernization of states’ child welfare information systems, as part of the basis behind the incubator initiative.
The EO outlined a “whole government approach” to improving child welfare, not only at HHS and ACF through the modernization of child welfare systems, but across other programs in the departments of Education, Labor, Treasury, Housing and Urban Development, and elsewhere, per ACF.
The Iowa project stood out, in part, because of the thoughtful planning the state had undertaken.
“So we wanted to highlight them as a way to say, this is really good planning,” Inman said. “And they did in two years what states sometimes take four or five years with their planning. So it was more like the process they used, not the technology they used. We’re not as focused on the technology.”
The Child Protective Services team currently uses the Family and Children’s System, a mainframe in service since the 1980s, Sample said. The state has entered into a contract with Google “to develop a modern, intuitive, and fully compliant” CCWIS, she said, “built with direct input from the social workers who do the work of keeping children safe.”
VISION will transform how child welfare work is completed and enhance outcomes for children and families, officials said.
“It will give workers more time with families and provide the right information they need to do their jobs effectively,” Sample said. “Iowa’s partnership with Google will serve as a road map for child welfare IT development nationally.”
