Evaluating the Effectivenessof Safe Start Collaboration

Using Network Analysis

George Cole/Dennis Orthner

Jordan Institute for Families

Underlying Assumptions

• All Safe Start sites are dedicating resources to fostering collaboration among the local organizations that serve children exposed to violence (CEV).

• Local inter-organizational collaboration at the operational (practical) level is the exception rather than the norm.

Why is Collaboration Rare?

• Helping organizations are neither mandated nor provided with incentives (funding) to work together to accomplish common goals.

• Instead,– public organizations function as independent proprietors of

programs that are constrained by narrow streams of state and federal funding;

– private organizations typically compete with one another for limited resources.

• All are busy.• All protect their turf.

Why is That a Problem?

• Organizations don’t systematically share information about services or clients:– clients not informed about the range of services available

to them– clients “get lost” or “fall through the cracks” between

services– service effectiveness suffers in the absence of crucial

information

• Organizations don’t plan together:– gaps in the availability of services– gaps and overlaps in use of resources

Does Collaboration Work?

Research has found that organizations that successfully collaborate experience an increase in– numbers of new clients identified and referrals;

– funding and resource exchange;

– joint assessment and service coordination;

– jointly sponsored training;

– interagency communication;

– speed between referral and intake;

– client access to services.

How Will Chatham County Safe Start Evaluate the Effectiveness

of its Collaborative Efforts?

1. Background

2. Methods

3. Measures

Background

1. County Characteristics

2. CEV Characteristics

3. Current State of the CEV System

4. Proposed CEV System

Chatham County Characteristics

• Geographically large (707 square miles)

• Rural (47,000 residents; < 75 per square mile)

• Largest community is Siler City (7,000 residents)

• Primarily a traditional agricultural economy

• 3 major labor intensive industries located in Siler City

• Overall, 13% of children < 5 live in poverty; 30% in Siler City

• Overall, 17 % African-American, 10% Latino; 50% Latino in Siler City

CEV Characteristics:Targets and Witnesses• O-8 year olds exposed to violence in two ways:

– as the targets (objects) of violence;

– as witnesses to violence.

• Most of the violence that 0-8 year olds are exposed to happens in their own homes:– about 30 per year substantiated for physical abuse;

– about 400 per year witness a violent domestic incident that results in a police call.

CEV Characteristics:Witness Incidents

• 69% of incidents involve physical violence• 22% of physically violent incidents involve use or

display of a weapon• 87% of incidents occur in residence• 52% male on female; 14% male on male; 14%

female on female• 38% white; 40% African-American; 18% Latino

Current State of the CEV System

• The current “CEV system” consists primarily of those organizations that serve the physically abused child and his/her family.

• Organizations that serve the child witness do so because the child is part of a family that is receiving services. These services are not tailored to the the needs of the child witness.

• No organization serves a child because he/she witnessed violence, unless the violent incident endangered the child in a manner consistent with a legal finding of neglect, and the child is a client of CPS.

Proposed CEV System

REDUCE IMPACT (focus on system, family)

L E/ COMM

L E/ COMM

L E/ COMM

C P S INTAKE

C P S INVST

SUB

NOT INVEST

C P S SVS

C P TEAM

CRT/ G A L

L E

COMM.

“1st RESPONDER”

REFUSE C E V SVS

C E V ASSESS

SUB AB SVS

D V SVS.

“FAM AD” SVS

“C F A” SVS

CLOSURE

CLOSURE

REDUCE EXPOSURE (focus on community)

E X P O S E D

C H I L D R E N

W I T N E S S

BOT H

V I C T I

M

UNSUB

C E V COORD

Provide/Enhance Services

Strengthen

Neighborhoods

Activities

Community Family Allies

Professional Education Lay Education

Enhance System Collaboration

FSTR CARE/ ADOPTION

SVS

TIME

Community I.D. and Referral

Source

Safe Start- funded Service

CPS/Child Welfare Service

Other Community

Service

Decision or Decision Point

Community Case Management

Team

Primary Safe Start Case Flow

Primary CPS/Child Welfare Case Flow

Secondary (Conditional) Case Flow

Primary Case Management

Information Flow

OTHER SVS

OTHER SVS

CRT

“HLTH FAM” SVS

THERAPY SVS

Methods

1. Annual Survey

2. Quantitative Data - System Performance

3. Network Data - Collaboration

Annual Survey

• Telephone interview

• Respondents are organizational key informants (line practitioners where possible)

• Snowball sampling, starting with Safe Start programs and most influential existing CEV organizations/programs

Quantitative Data – System Performance

• 12 questions rating the performance of the of the service system

• Areas of performance: (see handout)

• Point and longitudinal analyses - item and scale mean

Network Data - Collaboration

• Dyadic data regarding organization’s working relationships (“What other organizations do you work with in serving CEV?”)

• Characteristics of the relationship– referral/client information/training/planning/etc.– frequency of contact– productivity– if structured by protocol

• Point and longitudinal statistical analyses of dyadic data (degree; density; centrality; betweeness; reciprocity)

• Point and longitudinal graphic analyses of dyadic data

Why use Network Analysis to Evaluate Collaboration?Quantifies it and shows us what it “looks like:”

– who are the actors– where are the actors– who is working with whom– who is not working with whom– who is influential (who are the “gatekeepers” and

“stars”)– where are the “micro-networks”– where are the protocols and where are they most likely

to be working

A Look at The Current CEV System

Network Graphs

(the fun stuff)

Complete Network

Either Provides “Violence” Services

Both Provide “Violence” Services

Both Provide – Protocol Cited