An Evaluation of Resource and Assessment Centers (RAC)âOutcome Evaluation

To evaluate the impact each youth’s first RAC placement and of the RAC program, we must compare defined that as the “index event.” outcomes of youth in RAC placements to outcomes for a similar group of youth who The full RAC “treatment” pool includes 1,100 were initially placed in other foster care youth removed from regions 3 and 4 and settings. [...] In other analyses, we compare the first placement following RAC placement for the treatment group to the index placement for the comparison group. [...] To add context to our the index placement for comparison youth, findings for youth outcomes in the child there is no statistical difference between the welfare system, we first present raw groups suggesting that RAC placement did outcomes (Exhibit 4) for the full matched not affect the likelihood of placement with treatment and comparison groups as well as siblings beyond the RAC. [...] chance—values range from 0 (highly significant) to 1 (no 11 Type of Placement Number of Placement Changes We examined the likelihood that youth To account for differences in the amount of would be placed with a relative and the time youth spent in foster care, we likelihood that youth were placed in a foster examined the annualized number of home.34 As seen in Exhibit 6 youth who placement events. [...] The 2015 first placed in a RAC were, more likely than Legislature directed WSIPP to evaluate the youth placed immediately in foster homes effect of RAC placement on the likelihood a to be placed with a sibling during their RAC youth would be placed with siblings, placement, but there was no difference for placement type, number of subsequent the subsequent placement.