Illinois Department of Children and Family Services
FFY2011 Annual Progress and Services Report
95
monitoring, provision of counseling and parenting training, etc. These are billed separately, by
child ID, by unit, by date and are discretely countable, as noted above. Regarding the other
family reunification services that are now being offered through performance and specialized
foster care services, the Department is investigating the feasibility of adjusting the random
moment time survey to begin to specifically capture the discrete time and costs expended on
early reunification.
Time Limited Family Reunification services partially funded by Title IV-B, Subpart 2, relate to
almost all of the six measures of CFSR Permanency Outcome 1 (Children have permanency
and stability in their living situations) and to all six measures of CFSR Permanency Outcome 2
(The continuity of family relationships and connections is preserved). Over a long period of
years, the Illinois Department of Children and Family Services has contracted with major
universities for research to assist it to improve family reunification services. In addition, the
Division of Quality Assurance has also implemented a Post-Reunification Protocol with
questions and measures to be applied to individual cases and to studies of programs. Together
these attempt to measure the services and outcomes that lead to permanency and to successful,
lasting reunifications, and to cause an increase in those services that lead to success. The
measures in that protocol are dealing with the same services and outcome as the items covered
under CFSR Permanency Outcomes 1 and 2.
Adoption Promotion and Support
The Adoption Promotion and Support includes recruitment, assessment and monitoring of
homes. Additional services include: pre-adoption support groups; publicity in various forms to
inform the public regarding the children needing adoption so that matching takes place; post
adoption counseling; post adoption groups; and intensive adoption preservation.
Adoption preservation includes assessment, counseling, therapy, casework, community
linkages, diversion from psychiatric hospitals through intensive services, etc. In Illinois, these
services are delivered primarily by private agencies. Of these many services, a portion of the
Intensive Adoption Preservation services are the ones that are claimed to Title IV-B, while the
many other Adoption Promotion and Support services are all delivered using state funds. If the
federal grant were large enough, many of these services would be claimable from it. A
substantial number of community families who have never had an adoptive relationship with
the Department receive services through some of these programs at Department expense.
Intensive Adoption Preservation -- Eight programs totaling $6.15 million, offer these
services throughout the state. These programs provide emergency intervention,
assessment, casework services, therapy by M.A.-degreed workers, case planning,
support groups, respite, intervention and interaction with community services. The
purpose is to support the family, stabilize the adoption, prevent psychiatric
hospitalization of the adopted child, and prevent the adoption from dissolving. These
programs have participated actively in research that has been shared nationally at
adoption and family preservation conferences. Many of the agencies have also
participated in training community providers on the distinct problems and service needs
of adoptive families.
Older Caregivers Initiative – Three programs serving the Chicago/Cook County area
and immediate surrounding vicinity have begun and continued over the last 7 years.
