Child Welfare Data Dashboard

Minnesota’s public child welfare system is designed to serve the state’s children and families as well as the communities in which they live and work. Performance measures help monitor the outcomes of children touched by the child welfare system: The department, and its county and tribal partners, are responsible to ensure children:

• Are safe
• Remain with their families when safe to do so
• Receive services so children can return safely home and receive support to remain  at home safely
• Live in safe, stable homes with relatives whenever possible
• Achieve permanency through adoption, if needed.

The Child Welfare Data Dashboard is intended to provide information to the public as well as county and tribal decision-makers on nine state measures and seven federal measures used to monitor the status of children served by Minnesota’s child welfare system. This webpage works best when viewed using the Google Chrome web browser. The measures are separated into two distinct dashboards: One for state measures and another for federal measures. Although the dashboards use different measures and performance standards, they were designed to present information in parallel ways. 

Recent changes

The current version of the Child Welfare Data Dashboard was published in the fall of 2016, and is hosted on Tableau Public©. A Microsoft Excel © version of the dashboard data is available (see federal data and state data). Each tab of the dashboard is described in detail, below. See this supplemental document which contains details about each performance measure and information on changes to the dashboard.

Tab 1: Statewide performance data

This first page shows the overall status for the state on a given measure in a given year, including:

• A description of the measure
• Performance by agency, with additional details shown when hovering over a geographic area
• State trends for the previous three years
• A table describing the number of counties that have met or not met the performance standard
• Performance by racial and ethnic categories based on census groupings, and by age groupings (coming soon).

Tab 2: Agency details performance data

The second tab shows performance data for each measure in a table. The data can be filtered by both year and county or tribal agency. This page allows for comparison between up to three different agencies, and examination of a single agency over the last three years. Each row shows a different measure, including:

• Yearly performance
• Numerator and denominator used to calculate performance
• Met/Not Met status for each measure for a given year.

Tab 3: Progress and/or performance data to date

The third tab shows either progress or performance to date for each measure for the current calendar year, including:

• The performance standard
• A bar chart showing current data in relation to the performance standard
• A detailed and dynamic description of the data which reflects performance for a given agency (or the state, as a whole) for a specified measure.

Tab 4: Trends over time

The fourth tab shows performance data over time. This view mirrors the small line graph shown on the Tab 1, Statewide, but offers more functionality and detail. It defaults to showing statewide trends over time, but individual agencies can be selected. This will prompt the view to change to show both an agency’s performance over time as it compares to the rest of the state side-by-side — on this tab, the rest of state grouping shows the Minnesota performance data excluding the selected agency, including:

• Trends over time in relation to the performance standard for the specified measure
• Comparison of agency and rest of state performance data
• A supplementary table so that the performance, numerator, and denominator can be viewed next to the line graph(s).

Updating process and timing

The dashboard is scheduled to be refreshed by the 15th of each month so that the most recent information available is provided. This means that data points have the potential to change based on agency-level data entry and updates.