Resource Library

This guide is designed to support administrative leaders in states and other jurisdictions in using data to assess and identify ways to improve their service array.

Learn about the range of practices comprising the continuum of youth engagement to youth empowerment.

Discover how to examine and drill down into state data to build understanding of what’s happening in your child welfare system.

Get guidance, tips, and strategies for assessing agency culture and climate. 

Use this guide for tips, and strategies concerning the critical role leadership plays in creating and sustaining positive organizational culture.

Learn the importance of effective, ongoing collaboration between child welfare agencies and community-based partners.

Browse the themes and key takeaways from the How We Partner With the Community to Improve Service Options podcast series.

Explore considerations for equitable, inclusive, and data-driven problem exploration.

Explore information and strategies for advancing racial equity through problem exploration.

Identifies the first three steps in the problem exploration process and examines the importance of data, key components of a data plan, and common mistakes to avoid in identifying problems in child welfare.

Presents the first task of identifying a problem and provides examples of how to apply strategies. Needs and opportunities for improvement generally emerge through an analysis of source of data or information.

Identifies the final three steps in the problem exploration process and strategies that can help with analyzing data, root causes and contributing factors of problems, and common mistakes to avoid in problem exploration.

Explores the second task of creating a data plan to investigate the problem further. Creating a well-thought-out data plan helps the team plan for exploring the identified problem and move toward identifying a possible root cause or causes.

Presents the third task of collecting and analyzing data identified in the data plan to help answer research questions. Examining data helps teams tell a more complete story and understand the scope and impact the problem is having on the community.

This brief addresses both "identifying a problem" and "gathering data and exploring the problem indepth" in the first phase of the Change and Implementation Process.