Policy and Practice | October 2022

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By Anna Corley and Ty Abrams

Helping Improve Safety for Children: Illinois Department of Children and Family Services Reimagines Collaboration with Microsoft Teams

C ollaboration is a key factor for success in child welfare agencies. With the number of different people involved, the complex nature of casework, and other administrative burdens, it can be a challenge for caseworkers to communicate effec tively and consistently. This challenge only increased with the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic. Making it Easier to Keep Children Safe Under the leadership of Director Marc D. Smith, the Illinois Department of Children and Family Services (IL DCFS) has worked to improve connec tions between children and families, caseworkers, and other parties involved in families’ cases. Before and during the COVID-19 pandemic, the IL DCFS assembled a cross-functional team to discuss operational, financial, legal, and clinical aspects of an innovative development to casework practice. This team clearly identified that remote collaboration not only would enable connections that considered social dis tancing requirements, but also would create supportive care in a new way. Working together with Microsoft, the IL DCFS envisioned a collabora tion tool that would allow for use by numerous parties, video and phone capabilities, ease of documentation for case notes, and consistent support for children and families. The result of this collaboration is the Youth Teams App, a child welfare–specific solution residing

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workers being out on an island, trying to make decisions,” says Smith. With the use of the Youth Teams App, caseworkers have reported better engagement with families, foster parents, CASA workers, and court stakeholders. Instead of making 10 to 12 calls just to schedule a meeting, case workers can schedule meetings with a single process, which frees up critical

on the Microsoft Teams platform. The Youth Teams App is the first collabora tion solution that enables direct tie-in with child welfare case management systems, enabling creation of “teams” based on the people involved in the case, creation of documentation directly from scheduled meetings, and direct note updates based on content discussed in meetings. “If we let people communicate more often, they can make safety deci sions as a team, as opposed to individual

See Illinois on page 32

Image courtesy of Microsoft

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Policy&Practice October 2022