Introduction
A judge’s reasonable efforts decisions at child welfare hearings may avoid separating families and help children achieve permanency faster. As a result, judges play a critical role in child welfare cases, yet there is limited research on how they make decisions or how those decisions relate to case outcomes. This brief highlights the Reasonable Efforts Findings Study (REFS), which seeks to better understand how judges’ reasonable efforts decisions relate to case outcomes for children.
Purpose
The purpose of this document is to describe the REFS Study and what it seeks to learn about judicial decision-making, data the study will collect, the study sample, and the importance of the study to the legal community.
Citation
Klain, E. (2022). Introducing the reasonable efforts findings study (OPRE Report No. 2022-231). Washington, DC: Office of Planning, Research, and Evaluation, Administration for Children and Families, U.S. Department of Health and Human Services.