People iconImproving Child Welfare: Quality Case Planning

The Division of Safety and Permanence (DSP) continues to deliver updates on and improvements to child welfare practice through the Improving Child Welfare package. Improving Child Welfare is a collection of efforts aimed at better supporting families and the child welfare workforce by streamlining the work and centering family engagement. 

Quality Case Planning (QCP) is one of four projects within the Improving Child Welfare package. The QCP project exists to clarify and standardize child welfare case planning in Wisconsin so families are involved in the development and completion of the Family Case Plan. 

This project gathered information from the Business Process Reengineering (BPR) and Targeted Case Review (TCR) studies to assist the Department of Children and Families (DCF) in gathering insights for future quality case planning enhancements. The primary results highlighted these opportunity areas for considerations:

  1. Streamline the case planning process and decrease the time child welfare professionals (CPS and YJ) spend documenting information in eWiSACWIS.
  2. Replace the case plan template with a new template design that highlights essential information for the family, uses clear language and is designed to include youth and family voice. 
  3. Identify areas to strengthen child welfare professionals’ engagement and case planning skills.
  4. Explore external case plan examples from other states and county agencies to learn how the best aspects of them could be applied to Wisconsin’s Family Case Plan.

As a result of in-depth feedback, research and evaluation, the QCP project has two primary focuses: 

  1. Restructuring the case plan template in eWiSACWIS so that it is a tool that can be utilized consistently across child welfare practice. Quality case plans should be developed in full partnership with the child, youth and family to include culturally inclusive services; the case plan should also include goals that are specific, measurable, achievable, realistic and timely while addressing the reason for system involvement. 
  2. Supporting the workforce through training to build skill and competency in meaningful and effective family-centered engagement while case planning with children, youth and families.

February 2025 enhancements 

The case plan template in eWiSACWIS will see minor changes in February 2025.  These changes will reflect person-centered language, adjust the template layout and streamline some functions to set some foundational needs for future revisions. These changes are the first step to attend to some of the issues and recommendations that have been identified by stakeholders and through user feedback with eWiSACWIS. 

More comprehensive changes for a restructured Family Case Plan are in the planning stages with a projected release in 2026.