Denver (December 14, 2009)

The National Quality Improvement Center on Differential Response in Child Protective Services (QIC-DR) is pleased to announce today the award of $5.4 million to three sites to advance the state of the art in child protective services.

The newly awarded sites for research are: Colorado – a five-county consortium including Arapahoe, Fremont, Garfield, Jefferson and Larimer counties; the State of Illinois; and Ohio – a six-county consortium including Clark, Champaign, Madison, Montgomery, Richland and Summit counties.
These sites were selected in collaboration with a National Advisory Committee and an external review team.

The sites will aim to answer the core research question, “Is differential response an effective approach in child protective services and, if so, what are the specific elements that make it effective?” Differential response is an approach that allows child protective services agencies to respond to reports of child abuse and neglect according to the circumstances, such as the type and severity of the alleged maltreatment, the number of previous reports and the willingness of the parents to participate in services.

The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, Administration for Children and Families, Children's Bureau, awarded a grant to the American Humane Association and its partners, Walter R. McDonald & Associates, Inc. and the Institute of Applied Research, to operate this National Quality Improvement Center. All three organizations have expertise in differential response, and under the direction of the Office on Child Abuse and Neglect of the Children’s Bureau, these partners are uniquely positioned to collaborate and complement each other’s experiences, knowledge and networks.

For more information on the project, please visit www.differentialresponseqic.org. For more information about American Humane’s Children’s Division and programs please visit www.americanhumane.org/protecting-children. The information contained in this release can be reused and posted with proper credit given to the American Humane Association.