One of the biggest challenges in our field is dissemination.

Dissemination is defined as “the action or fact of spreading something, especially information, widely.”

The child welfare court system is one of the most understudied areas of child welfare. This is likely due to a combination of factors, such as access concerns, lack of interest from the academic field, and funding. That is why it is critical to share information learned on the local or state level more broadly. Data collected by one site, even if for purposes of continuous quality improvement or self-evaluation, can help contribute to a larger understanding in the field of what works. Yet, most states, even when commissioning evaluation studies, do not publicly share their findings, for a number of reasons. The following is a list of commonly shared reasons for not sharing findings with a response.

• My study is not “good enough” to share. Professionals working in the child welfare court system or child welfare court administration often lack the expertise to design and conduct robust evaluations of their efforts. They collect data or work with consultants to gather the information they need to make programmatic decisions about whether to keep a program, expand a program more broadly, or discontinue a program. However, they do not often feel that their studies are rigorous enough to share with the public and thus, keep them internal.

• Response: Because there is little funding, resources, and attention to the child welfare court process, all studies can make a meaningful contribution to the field by providing additional information to inform a growing evidence base. Even if the study is not rigorous or well designed, if the descriptive findings are similar across multiple states, then it demonstrates a trend that can be further explored. These studies often provide important starting points for future research.

• The findings were not what was expected or there were no findings. Another concern often heard from the field is that the findings were not what was anticipated. If an evaluation does not demonstrate that the program had its intended effect, then many do not want to share it more broadly. In particular, if the evaluation showed no effect of the program or a negative effect, it may not be shared.

• Response: This is also true in academia. When a study has null findings, it is often not published. However, this misses an important opportunity in the field for others to learn from. If the program you implemented does not lead to a reduced time to permanency, that does not mean that you should not share it. In fact, this can help others to make important programmatic decisions about the program they should use. Learning what does not work is just as important as learning what works. Sharing these findings help the field make more informed decisions, which can lead to better outcomes for children and families.

• Court administrators or others may not be supportive of sharing findings beyond the local jurisdiction or core group of stakeholders. Another reason the findings of studies may not be disseminated is that court administrators or others in a position to approve report-sharing may not be supportive of broadly sharing the results of a study.

• Response: It’s important to learn what the specific concerns are for broadly sharing research findings. Knowing what the barriers are can help you to overcome those barriers and alleviate concerns. For example, if court administrators are concerned about identifying judges or courts with bad practice in your report, you can assure them that the report will not identify specific judges or courts and that findings will be discussed in aggregate and not at the individual case, court or judge level.

• Lack of time or staff resources to develop report into something suitable for widespread dissemination. It is often the case that a “formal” report of findings from a study is not produced or the report that is produced is not considered suitable for widespread dissemination. When this happens, valuable findings that can inform the field remain on the shelf – informing the local jurisdiction but not contributing to the wider knowledge base of what works.

• Response: If you lack the time or staff resources to develop the report into something suitable for widespread dissemination, consider other ways to get the findings to the field, such as making presentations at professional conferences. Also, consider a partnership with your local university to facilitate report writing. We’ll discuss these more in our next section.