Child welfare foster care software that keeps every permanency clock visible
Child welfare foster care is the out of home care system a title IV-E agency runs when a child cannot safely remain at home, covering placement, supervision, court reporting and permanency. Agencies report AFCARS data for two periods a year and must submit each file within 45 days of the period closing, under 45 CFR 1355.40. A petition to terminate parental rights is due once a child has been in care 15 of the most recent 22 months. Neurobird captures placements, visits and clocks as they happen, so the deadline and the federal file come out of the same record.
Neurobird Child Welfare Foster Care in short
- Capture placement moves as dated events with reason and level of care, at the moment they happen
- Track the statutory clocks per child: the 60 day reasonable efforts determination, the 12 month permanency hearing, the 15 of 22 month petition
- Log caseworker visits and contacts against the child rather than against a monthly summary
- 45 days Title IV-E agencies must submit the out of home care and adoption assistance data files within 45 days of the end of each report period, meaning by May 15 and by November 14 each year. eCFR, 45 CFR 1355.40
- 15 of 22 A petition to terminate parental rights is required once a child has been in foster care for 15 of the most recent 22 months, filed by the end of the fifteenth month, under 45 CFR 1356.21. eCFR, 45 CFR 1356
- Pricing runs 185 to 780 US dollars per month across 3 tiers. Early access is free.
What child welfare agencies and foster care programs actually deal with
Why it stays broken
The federal rules are precise and the case is narrative. 45 CFR 1355.40 wants dated, coded events, and the caseworker has a phone call, a car journey and a text box. Nothing in between turns one into the other, so the data gets assembled twice a year by people who were not there.
A missed 60 day judicial determination can make a whole placement ineligible for title IV-E reimbursement.
A shortage or lack of foster family homes shall not be an acceptable reason for determining that the needs of the child cannot be met in a foster family home.
Neurobird Child Welfare Foster Care Compliance Platform
Capture the event when it happens, in the shape the rule already requires. The report stops being a reconstruction and the clocks stop being a surprise.
- 1Capture placement moves as dated events with reason and level of care, at the moment they happen
- 2Track the statutory clocks per child: the 60 day reasonable efforts determination, the 12 month permanency hearing, the 15 of 22 month petition
- 3Log caseworker visits and contacts against the child rather than against a monthly summary
- 4Produce the AFCARS out of home care file from the live record instead of rebuilding it twice a year
What changes with Neurobird Child Welfare Foster Care?
The same work, read left to right: how it runs today, and how it runs once the record is in one place.
| Today | With Neurobird Child Welfare Foster Care |
|---|---|
| Placement matching happens on the phone at 9pm, and the record of why that home was chosen is a note somebody types two days later | Capture placement moves as dated events with reason and level of care, at the moment they happen |
| The AFCARS file is due 45 days after the report period closes, and half the fields get reconstructed from case notes instead of captured when the event happened | Track the statutory clocks per child: the 60 day reasonable efforts determination, the 12 month permanency hearing, the 15 of 22 month petition |
| The 15 of 22 month clock runs whether anyone is watching it or not, and the petition deadline lands before the paperwork does | Log caseworker visits and contacts against the child rather than against a monthly summary |
Who is this for?
Same statutory clocks, three different operating realities.
You place and supervise directly
Your caseworkers do the matching and the visits. You need the event captured in the car, not retyped at 7pm, so the 60 day and 12 month dates hold.
You hold contracted placements
You answer to the placing agency and to licensing at the same time. You need one record that satisfies both without keeping two.
You own the AFCARS submission
Two files a year, 45 days after each period, built from many counties. You need consistency in the data elements rather than county by county heroics.
The placement record, as a caseworker would keep it
A working preview. Tick an item to file it against the case.
| Requirement | Status | Next due | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Level of care reassessment | current | in 42d | |
| Monthly in home caseworker visit | due soon | in 9d | |
| Court report due Friday | current | in 120d | |
| Sibling group of 3, same county placement | overdue | 3d late | |
| ICPC packet, outgoing | current | in 64d |
Tick a requirement to file evidence against it.
What title IV-E actually requires of a foster care agency
Useful if you are scoping a case management build or defending a title IV-E claim. Each source links out.
Title IV-E agencies must submit the out of home care and adoption assistance data files within 45 days of the end of each report period, meaning by May 15 and by November 14 each year.
eCFR, 45 CFR 1355.40A petition to terminate parental rights is required once a child has been in foster care for 15 of the most recent 22 months, filed by the end of the fifteenth month, under 45 CFR 1356.21.
eCFR, 45 CFR 1356The judicial determination on whether reasonable efforts were made to prevent removal must be made no later than 60 days from the date the child is removed, or the placement is not title IV-E eligible for that episode.
eCFR, 45 CFR 1356.21Permanency hearing requirements sit in section 475(5)(C) of the Social Security Act, the statute behind the 12 month hearing schedule agencies are measured against.
GovInfo, 42 U.S.C. chapter 7 subchapter IV part EThe same 45 CFR 1355 rules that set AFCARS also govern the child and family services reviews, so a weak data element shows up later as a weak safety or permanency finding.
eCFR, 45 CFR 1355How does Neurobird Child Welfare Foster Care work?
Log the move, not the memory
Every placement change is a dated event with reason, setting and level of care, entered on the day it happens.
Run the clocks per child
Removal date drives the 60 day determination, the 12 month permanency hearing and the 15 of 22 month petition. The dates are calculated, not remembered.
Export the file, do not rebuild it
The out of home care data elements are already populated, so the May 15 and November 14 submissions become a check rather than a project.
Child welfare foster care software questions, answered
Key terms
- What is foster care case management?
- Foster care case management is the work of placing a child in out of home care, supervising that placement and moving the case toward permanency under title IV-E rules. It covers matching, visits, court reporting and federal data submission, and one caseworker usually carries all of it for a full caseload at once.
- What is AFCARS and when is it due?
- AFCARS is the Adoption and Foster Care Analysis and Reporting System. Title IV-E agencies report two periods per federal fiscal year, October 1 to March 31 and April 1 to September 30, and must submit the out of home care and adoption assistance files within 45 days of each period ending, so by May 15 and November 14 under 45 CFR 1355.40.
- What is the 15 of 22 month rule?
- Under 45 CFR 1356.21 the agency must file, or seek to join, a petition to terminate parental rights once a child has been in foster care for 15 of the most recent 22 months, with the petition filed by the end of the fifteenth month. The rule came in with the Adoption and Safe Families Act of 1997 and there are stated exceptions, but the clock itself runs from removal.
Does this replace our state CCWIS?
No. It sits in front of it. Workers capture placements, visits and clock events here, and the structured record feeds the state system and the federal file rather than being retyped out of narrative notes.
Can it handle ICPC and cross county placements?
Yes. An interstate or cross county placement is tracked as its own workflow with its own packet, dates and approvals, because the delay is almost always in the packet rather than in the match.
Why we are building this
Foster care runs on dates. Removal, determination, hearing, petition. The rules are written in days and months, and the record is written in paragraphs.
That mismatch is why the federal file gets rebuilt twice a year and why a clock occasionally runs out on a child whose case was otherwise going fine. It is a capture problem, not a caring problem.
We would rather build this with people who carry caseloads. Tell us how your clocks are tracked today, and where we have got it wrong.
Where the requirement comes from
The rules that set the deadlines, and where the outcome data comes from.
- eCFR, 45 CFR 1355.40 AFCARS reporting The reporting periods, the 45 day submission window and what the out of home care file must contain.
- eCFR, 45 CFR 1356 title IV-E requirements Eligibility, judicial determinations, licensing of foster family homes and the 15 of 22 month petition rule.
- GovInfo, 42 U.S.C. title IV part E The statute itself, including the case review and permanency hearing requirements in section 475.
- eCFR, 45 CFR 1355 child and family services reviews How the submitted AFCARS data feeds the federal review process and the statewide data indicators.
How much does Neurobird Child Welfare Foster Care cost?
Priced per caseworker seat because the work is per pair of hands. Children, placements and providers are unlimited on every tier.
- Placement event log
- Visit and contact logging
- Permanency clock tracking
- Provider and home records
- Email support
- Everything in Single program
- AFCARS data element mapping
- Court report assembly
- Supervisor review queue
- Named contact
- Everything in Agency
- CCWIS export and reconciliation
- ICPC and cross county workflows
- Outcomes indicator reporting
- Onboarding included
Get free early access
If you run placements, tell us where your AFCARS data actually comes from today and what breaks first.
Straight answer on where this is: In development. Early access gets the working preview, a say in what ships first, and early access pricing. It does not get you a login today.
Prefer email? Write to office@neurobird.com and a person will reply. No autoresponder.