National Wraparound Initiative's Wraparound Blog

Upcoming Webinar to Spotlight Wraparound Evaluation Methods

April 08, 2024 | NWI

Each state and community’s system of care aims to achieve the same thing: To provide children and youth with the support they need to live and thrive in their homes, schools, and communities.

And yet, each system of care is unique, with varying approaches to financing services, collaborating across agencies and providers, training and coaching frontline staff, identifying and enrolling families in services, and much more. Such variation allows researchers such as those affiliated with the NWI empirically examine what factors are associated with quality and fidelity as well as outcomes.

Each system of care’s approach to evaluation is unique as well. Although the NWI and its partners encourage use of certain tools to stay on track, such as the measures of the Wraparound Fidelity Assessment System (WFAS), states, communities, and provider organizations all invest in different methods to collect and use data.

A few examples: Some states and systems may require local counties or contracted providers to collect and report data, while others invest in a state center of excellence to do much of the work. Some states and systems emphasize measuring fidelity for individual staff persons’ coaching and professional development while others are committed to getting information to inform improvement at the system and program level. Some evaluation teams invest in family and youth leaders to collect data, while others use evaluation staff or students.

The University of Washington Wraparound Evaluation and Research Team (UW WERT) learned this firsthand just last week, as we attended a Continuous Quality Improvement (CQI) conference hosted by California’s Department of Social Services. At the conference, WERT team members co-presented with representatives from DSS and four different Wraparound providers on an exciting new Wraparound initiative that aims to pilot test a comprehensive approach to evaluating Wraparound using WFAS tools and its accompanying web-based data system, WrapStat.

Because every state and system does things differently – and such decisions are not easy ones – the UW WERT is pleased to host a webinar on April 16 featuring leaders from four states’ Wraparound evaluation initiatives – one from each time zone!

Join us as representatives from West Virginia (Marshall University), Illinois (Department of Social Services), New Mexico (Children, Youth and Families Department), and Oregon (Portland State University) describe their unique approaches to evaluating Wraparound and systems of care in their state, including:

• Decisions around setting up evaluation cycles for instruments such as the Wraparound Fidelity Index (WFI-EZ), Team Observation Measure (TOM), and Document Assessment and Review Tool (DART)  management – One point person for all providers vital. Share how cycles set up, parameters for selecting sampling.
• Ideal sample sizes for regular fidelity data collection.
• Tips for engaging families and maximizing response rates
• Staffing, hiring, and resourcing evaluation
• Training and certifying reviewers on the DART
• How the fidelity, satisfaction, and outcomes data are used, such as for professional development with individual care coordinators as well as provider and systems levels
• Engaging leaders at the system and provider level to review and use the data

Thanks to our presenters, and to all in the NWI community who can join this lively discussion about data!