Improving Outcomes For Children, Philadelphia Child Welfare Services

8. Measuring Performance and Outcomes All child welfare agencies must regularly assess the degree to which they are effectively discharging their legally mandated functions and attaining outcomes related to child safety, permanency, and family and child well-being. DHS and the CUAs have made a number of major steps forward in developing performance and outcomes measurement processes, but there remains areas for improvement. For example, the small sample size for conducting QSRs in CUAs needs to be increased to provide more reliable data on each CUA’s performance. Recommendations of evaluators included expanding the number of cases reviewed in the QSR from forty-eight picked at random to 120 in total annually with a representative sample from each CUA based on their case census; and ensuring that the CUA scorecard reflects key quality outcomes related to safety, permanency, and well-being informed by QSRs.