originally written by: KristieMaureen
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If you'll check back to my original post on this thread, I specifically state that the statistics show 1/3 as the conservative estimate (30 or more percent is what you'll be looking for in the citations). I then applied that percentage to the approximate total number of children in foster care, listed in most references as around 500,000. My calculation, based on the information I found, is where the 165,000 estimate comes from. In particular, check the testimony from the California State representative before the federal subcommittee, as well as the Illinois citations. I've provided the references for where I found this data, as well as the other information I posted that was not personal experience.
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KristieMaureen: I am sorry if you feel I have called your credibility into question. However it is very irresponsible to spout statistics when they have not been scientifically formulated and are not properly documented. Much of your data comes prior to the 1997 Safe Families Act whereby many changes were made to the system, funding of the system, and reporting. There were many changes made in a broad number of areas in 1997--including the adoption subsidies, and foster family pay.
Also as a result of the 1997 laws most states initiated watchdogs--or advocates to be assigned to EACH and EVERY child in the system. In most states the moment a child is removed from a parent--an advocate is assigned to "WATCH the STATE." These advocates are NOT paid and are NOT part of the system and many are people who have been involved by adoption or as foster parents, some are lawyers, and others are elderly people who only care about the welfare of the children. In Oregon these people are called "CASA's" and NOTHING happens to a child in the system without the CASA being involved and a party to each and every action. These safeguards have been set up in many states just to prevent what you are upset about. I do not know if California or Illinois has established a watchdog system yet....
I discount any data or report you have prior to 1997 that was SIX years ago and there has been an AGGRESSIVE effort to remedy the exact issues you bring up. Most of the material you are using to base your opinion on is out of date and prior to the Safe Families Act and implementation of changes to the system that MANY OF US WORKED VERY HARD TO SEE HAPPEN. To berate the efforts some of us have been actively working on for 10-15 years by invalidating the progress we have made by using outdated info and applying it across the board to each state is really a SLAP in the FACE!
California and Illinois are states with two of the highest populations out of the 50 states. To assume that the statistics from these two states can be applied across the 50 states as you have done is a great error and inaccurate use of the research material you are using to validate your position.
A great deal of the references you have provided are part of one legislative report which is actually a 'critical' report on one specific issue. Your assumption that 165,000 children in foster care have been wrongfully removed counts the children in every state. While California and Illinois may have these problems Each State is different and Each State has their own criteria and issues to deal with......
Your statistics are NOT valid. For your stats to be acceptable your need to:
Find out exactly how many children were in Foster Care for the states you are citing---for the year of the report your citation mentions. Then you may do your 30% math on those states to come up with the number of children in those states during that year who were wrongfully removed....... Unless or until the numbers for EACH State on wrongful removals can be found for the same years---and unless your use the accurate overall number of Foster Children for each year you CANNOT apply the statistical assumption that you have.
Sorry but, this is why it is so difficult in our country to offer up exact and firm numbers for ANYTHING. Statistics are not about guessing and extrapolating the data----This is also why EACH State is responsible for their own Foster Care System--as many states have different rules and protocol and data is kept in different forms and meets different criteria. There is an ESTIMATED number of 500,000 children in Foster Care in the US and the government is very careful to be clear this is not a statically evaluated number. The National government would not ever offer a numbers like you have---it is irresponsible to do so and it is not appropriate to do so. You are using numbers from a few states---years ago and applying them to the total number of children estimated to be in Foster Care today?????