On May 26 and 27 2016, The White House hosted the first ever #HackFosterCare event. This was to gather various stakeholders to examine how technology can assist in improving foster care. The White House and other government agencies seem to be sponsoring more of these events.
I cut my social work teeth in foster care and foster care prevention. Despite not being there I wanted to keep up with what was happening. So I followed another hashtag on twitter (are you picking up this theme in my posts lately 😉 ).There were great idea’s for apps and technology to provide education, engage youth, recruit/retain foster parents, and facilitate communication.
Putting my prevention hat on, it is often difficult for providers in various disciplines to communicate. My wish would be to work on technology that can improve communication between systems prior to foster care placement. As things get more computerized there is little or no reason that Families, Child Welfare, Mental Health, Substance Abuse, and other nonprofit child serving agencies can collaborate better via technology.
Technology has the potential to prevent placement but also decrease length of stay. Things like secure SMS and telehealth can bring families and providers closer together.
This is my wish but find out what others came up with by clicking on the below links of my summary of tweets of this two day event…
How would you hack foster care?
Also keep the conversation going at HackFosterCare.org
