Informing the Placement Continuum: Classifying Children in Out-of-Home Placement Using Integrated Administrative Data

This report presents results from a proof of concept study that examined whether administrative data contained in the DSHS Integrated Client Database (ICDB) could group children in out-of-home care according to their characteristics, needs, and experiences. We found that measures built using cross-agency administrative data contained in the ICDB assigned children to ten mutually exclusive groups that were associated with placement outcomes and child welfare costs. The report summarizes the characteristics and outcomes for children in each of the ten groups and discusses how this analysis may inform DCYF’s efforts to expand its out-of-home placement continuum.