The Department for Children and Families (DCF) and its private case management providers administer the foster care system in Kansas. The case management providers develop case plans for children in foster care.  Those plans document a child's permanency goal and the tasks his or her parents must complete to achieve that goal. We reviewed 48 children's case plans to see if the parents' tasks appeared to be reasonable and relevant to reunification. The tasks we reviewed were generally reasonable and relevant, and parents generally made progress on or completed their tasks. 

Additionally, we used regression analyses to help determine how demographic factors affect children’s foster care outcomes (e.g., reunification, adoption, emancipation). Those analyses showed children's permanency outcomes varied based on race, ethnicity, age, and sex.  Although children's outcomes were similar overall, being Black, American Indian, or Hispanic had a meaningful effect on children's outcomes when compared to White or non-Hispanic children. Older children also were less likely to reunify or be adopted than younger children. And female children were less likely to be transferred to another agency than male children.