This document analyzes the overrepresentation of African American children and families in the child welfare system. It identifies this as a widespread problem that has negatively impacted African Americans. Several key factors that contribute to and perpetuate the problem are discussed, including institutional racism, the Adoption and Safe Families Act, poverty rates among African Americans, and the criminal justice system's disproportionate impact on African Americans. The CEO of Black Family Development, Inc. views overrepresentation as a serious issue caused by organizational biases and lack of cultural competence within child welfare agencies. Solutions proposed include improving data collection, establishing committees on racial equity, and providing ongoing cultural training.

1. RUNNING HEAD: PROBLEM ANALYSIS & NEED INDENTICATION PAPER
Problem Analysis and Need Identification Paper
Latagia Copeland-Tyronce [latagia.copeland@wayne.edu]
Wayne State University School of Social Work
Intervention & Program Planning: SW 8015
March 14, 2018

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INDENTIFYING & DESCRIBING THE PROBLEM (WHO’S NEGATIVELY
AFFECTED & COSTS)
Some scholars have compared the American child welfare system to the criminal justice
system, and justifiably so, in that both have a substantial history of discriminatory policies and
racial classification that have either excluded or over included African Americans. The marked
and continued overrepresentation, and associated negative outcomes, of African American
children and families within the child welfare system is the problem that I will be discussing in
this paper. Racial disparities within the child welfare is not a new and/or recent problem, and in
fact, the issue has received a great deal attention, at various levels, since the 1990s. A significant
amount of research has documented the overrepresentation of certain racial and ethnic
populations in the child welfare system when compared with their representation in the general
population (Child Welfare Information Gateway, 2016).
More than any other racial group, it is African Americans that are affected by, and
harmed, the most by these well documented child welfare racial disparities. According to the
U.S. Government Accountability Office (GAO), African Americans make up around 34 percent
of the foster-care population, but only 15 percent of the general child population and are more
than twice as likely to enter foster care compared with white children in 2004 (United States.,
Government Accountability Office, 2007). It has become blatantly and undeniably apparent that
racial to child welfare scholars that disparities exist and are evident at every critical decision
point within the child welfare system (Annie E. Casey Foundation, 2006).
In 2000, The first round of the Child and Family Services Reviews (also known as
CFSRs) listed several State Final Reports that acknowledged the problem of overrepresentation

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of minority groups and/or disproportionality within child welfare system. According to the CFSR
report, at least 25 State first-round Final Reports identified significant gaps in the provision of
culturally appropriate services, and at least 24 State Final Reports indicated that language
differences are a barrier to providing and receiving services, case planning, investigations, or
training (Child Welfare Information Gateway, 2016).
Moreover, only 21 States (about 40 percent) received a positive rating on the first round
CFSR indicator regarding whether a State’s recruitment efforts for foster and adoptive parents
reflected the actual racial and ethnic diversity of children in need of out-of-home care (U.S.
Department of Health and Human Services [HHS], Children’s Bureau, 2012). In the second
round of CFSRs, only 19 States (37 percent) received a positive rating regarding State efforts to
recruit and retain resource parents who reflect the racial and ethnic diversity of the foster care
population in that State (HHS, 2011).
PROBLEM IN TERMS OF NEED
As demonstrated above, overrepresentation of African American Children within the
child welfare system is a problem nationwide but is also a problem here in Michigan. According
a report released in 2014 by the Michigan Coalition for Race Equity in Child Welfare and
Juvenile Justice, an organization created in 2011 to investigate the issue of overrepresentation of
African American children and families in the Michigan child welfare system, African-American
children were 64 percent more likely to have formal investigations initiated into possible abuse
and neglect by their parents or others.
The coalition also found that even though the investigations of African-American
families showed relatively fewer cases of the most serious abuse and neglect, the children were

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26 percent more likely to be removed from their homes and placed in foster care. And finally, the
coalition found that African-American children were more than twice as likely to “age out” of
the foster care system, meaning they were unable to return to their families or be permanently
placed with another relative or an adoptive family (Michigan Race Equity Coalition, 2014).
Bradshaw’s typology of needs states that there are four types of needs. These needs are:
normative (which are distinguished by professionals and/or experts), felt (wants, wishes and
desires), expressed (vocalized needs) and comparative needs which are needs that arise in one
location may be similar for people with similar socio-demographic characteristics living in
another location (Bradshaw, 1972). When applying Bradshaw’s logic, I would classify the issue
of overrepresentation of African American children and families within the child welfare system
as both normative and comparative in nature. This is a normative need in that social and human
services professional have long been rising concerns and thinking of ways to address it and have
been doing so for decades. Moreover, it is a comparative need because it is a problem which is
pervasive and an issue in almost all states (in varying levels of course).
KEY VARIABLES THAT CREATE & PERPETUATE THE PROBLEM (SCOPE
& SEVERITY)
There are several (complex) variables that contribute to the problem of
overrepresentation of African American children and families within the child welfare system.
Institutional and/or structural racism is at the root of the problem in that most indications point to
the fact that the entrapment of minority children in out-of-home placements is primarily due to
discriminatory practices which expands throughout the entire child welfare system (Peebles-
Wilkins, 2001). That said, one of the main (and some say is the biggest) contributors to this

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problem is the Adoption and Safe Families Act (P.L. 105-89) also known as ASFA which was
signed into law in 1997 by then president Bill Clinton.
And while, I believe that the law makers that created and signed ASFA into law had good
intentions, there have been some devastating consequences for African American families as a
result. ASFA, purposely or otherwise, failed, and continues to fail, to take into account the very
fact that African Americans have long been subjected to marginalization, discrimination, and
institutional racism. Moreover, once African American, and other minority, children entered the
child welfare system, issues started to immediately appear, mainly, the high removal rates and
lack of quality and culturally sensitive services. And unlike previous child welfare legislation,
specifically the Adoption Assistance and Child Welfare Act of 1980 (also known as AACWA)
(P.L. 96-272), which favored achieving permanency through “reasonable efforts” towards
reunification and maintaining the familial structure; ASFA, effectively eliminated the
“reasonable efforts” requirement and steadfastly focusing on adoption (through speedy
termination of parental rights) as the best possible permanency solution for children in foster care
(Adoption and Safe Families Act of 1997, Pub. L. No. 105-89, 111 Stat. 2115).
And while race (both institutional and structural) plays an undeniable and significant role
in the disparities that exist within the system so too does socioeconomic status. According to
University of Pennsylvania law professor Dorothy Roberts, poverty is also a leading cause of
children landing in foster care (Roberts, 2002). In fact, one study actually concluded that poor
families are up to 22 times more likely to be involved in the child-welfare system than wealthier
families; and since African Americans are more likely to be poor they are affected disparately
(Burroughs, 2008).

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Here in Michigan childhood poverty is a major issue, as it is everywhere else, but this is
especially the case for African American children in the state. According to a recent report
released by the Michigan League of Public Policy, child poverty rates vary dramatically based on
race and ethnicity. In 2014, nearly half (47%) of all African‐American children and one‐third
(32%) of Hispanic children lived in poverty (family income below $18,850 for a family of three),
compared to 16% of non‐Hispanic white children. Moreover, the reported indicated that very
young children are much more likely to live in poverty. More than half (54%) of African‐
American children under the age of 6 and 34% of young Hispanic children live in poverty in
2013, compared to 18% of non‐Hispanic white children (Sorenson, 2015).
Even still, some social work scholars, most notably Dr. Claudia Lawrence-Webb,
attribute African American overrepresentation within the child welfare system to what is known
as the Flemming Rule. The Femming Rule which was implemented to ensure that the basic needs
of children were met to prevent problems that lead to neglect. However, the mandates that are a
part of the Flemming Rule were not responsive and/or sensitive to the actual needs of African
Americans. Moreover, Dr. Lawrence-Webb maintains that, "the Flemming Rule set up a
situation in which African Americans were involved in a service system for which they could not
withdraw once the neglect label was invoked" (Lawrence-Webb, 1997). The Flemming Rule of
the child welfare system can, and should, be compared to slavery and Jim Crow laws of the
criminal justice system, in that both policies were meant implemented as a means of controlling
African Americans social behaviors by placing them into governmental systems of social control
(Honore'-Collins, 2005).
And while racism (and implicit and explicit), along with staggering poverty, significantly
contribute to the overrepresentation of African American children and families within the child

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welfare system, there is another ominous social system that it is also a major contributor to the
problem. And just as is in the case of our child welfare system the overrepresentation of African
Americans (both men and women) involved in the penal system is also well documented. There
are many reasons why the criminal justice system disproportionately affects African Americans,
a phenomenon termed disproportionate minority contact, from the “War on Drugs” to racism
and prejudice built into the very criminal laws themselves. To elaborate further, Sheila Bedi legal
scholar and Professor of Law at Northwestern School of Law, asserts that discriminatory penal
practices started during slavery, not with the implementation of war on drugs policies.
Moreover, she states that, "Embedded racism in the criminal justice system is born of the
same hatred and fear that spawned slavery, Jim Crow, anti-miscegenation laws, and exclusionary
immigration policy" (Bedi, 2003). Professor Bedi also explains that racial profiling or race
classification was necessary to implement the racially differentiation laws of slavery, Jim Crow,
anti-miscegenation, and exclusionary immigration. Paula Johnson, an attorney of law in
Michigan, states, "Not only is race used to identify criminals, it is embedded in the very
foundation of criminal laws” (as cited by Bedi, 2003). Whatever the reason, the result is clear,
the criminal justice system (in addition and relation to the child welfare system) rips African
American families apart. Together, both systems have led to and created a cultural genocide in
the African American community. With the institutional/structural racism and bias built into our
American social systems, it is going to be very difficult, if not outright impossible, to address the
issue of overrepresentation without addressing it from both a legal and social perspective.
THE AGENCY’S VIEW OF THE PROBLEM

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I believe that it is safe to say that Black Family Development, Inc does agree that
overrepresentation of African American children and families is indeed a problem and an issue
worth developing interventions and directing efforts to address. According to BFDI’s CEO,
Alice G. Thompson, overrepresentation is caused and/or execrated by organizational bias,
practices and procedures, system racism, delay in exit from system, lack of community
resources, lack of adequate prevention, inadequate funding and services, and lack of adequate
cultural training. Moreover, Ms. Thompson asserts that organizational issues within child welfare
agencies cause the lions share of the issues and problems associated with overpreparation. Ms.
Thompson further concludes that assessment bias (explicit and implicit), practice/policy barriers,
organizational structural factors, insufficient training, and lack measurable strategies for exiting
system are all major contributors to the problem on an organizational level (Thompson, 2018).
Ms. Thompson asserts that the best ways to address the problem of overrepresentation is
through data collection and organizational monitoring, establishing a committee or process on
overrepresentation, Race, Equity and Cultural Competence Committee work group (and infusing
with continuous quality improvement or utilization reviews), making data driven decision with
values, and to continue providing ongoing culturally appropriate training to child welfare
professionals. Ms. Thompson also would like to see child welfare organizations encourage open
and authentic communication about potential bias and to examine bias at points of decision
making. Moreover, Ms. Thompson implores child welfare organizations to consistently
transform the organization to meet the needs of the youth and families, valuing parents as
partners, think and plan for the exit of the youth at intake, and to change outcomes for children,
families, and the community as our behaviors changes (be flexible) (Thompson, 2018).

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References
United States., Government Accountability Office. (2007). African American children in foster
care additional HHS assistance needed to help states reduce the proportion in care: Report to the
Chairman, Committee on Ways and Means, House of Representatives. Washington, D.C.: U.S.
Govt. Accountability Office.
Race Matters: Unequal Opportunity within the Child Welfare System - The Annie E. Casey
Foundation. (2006, January 01). Retrieved February 09, 2016, from
http://www.aecf.org/resources/race-matters-unequal-opportunity-within-the-child-welfare-
system/
Child Welfare Information Gateway. (2016). Racial disproportionality and disparity in child
welfare. Washington, DC: U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, Children’s Bureau.
Adoption and Safe Families Act of 1997, Pub. L. No. 105-89, 111 Stat. 2115 (1997)(codified in
scattered sections of 42 U.S.C.)
Peebles-Wilkins. (2001). Janie Porter Barrett and the Virginia Industrial School for colored girls:
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American leadership and empowerment tradition in social welfare history, pp. 123-135.
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ON AFRICAN AMERICAN CHILDREN IN THE CHILD WELFARE SYSTEM." Race,
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Roberts, D. E. (2002). Shattered bonds: The color of child welfare. New York: Basic Books
Burroughs, G. (2008). Ms. Magazine | Too Poor to Parent? | spring 2008. Retrieved June 09,
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but Deep Disparities Persist (Rep.). Retrieved March 8, 2018, from Michigan League For Public
Policy website: http://www.mlpp.org/wp-content/uploads/2015/09/BB-2016-State-
Budget_Children-Families.pdf

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Lawrence-Webb, C. (1997). African American children in the modern child welfare system: a
legacy of the Flemming Rule. Child Welfare, 76(1):9-31
Bedi, S.A. (2003). The constructed identities of Asian and African Americans: A story of two
races and the criminal justice system. Harvard Black Letter Law Journal, 19:181-199.
Thompson , A. G. (n.d.). Overrepresentation of Children of Color in Michigan's Child Welfare
System: Where Do We Go From Here. Retrieved March 14, 2018, from
http://blackfamilydevelopment.org/docs/agt-powerpoint_files/frame.htm