Entry and Exit Disparities in the Tennessee Foster Care System

CHAPIN HALL DISCUSSION PAPER

Entry and Exit Disparities in the Tennessee Foster Care System

FRED WULCZYN BRIDGET TE LERY JENNIFER HAIGHT

DECEMBER 2006

Entry and Exit Disparities in the Tennessee Foster Care System Authors Fred Wulczyn, Bridgette Lery, and Jennifer Haight Chapin Hall Center for Children at the University of Chicago

Acknowledgements The authors wish to express their appreciation to the Tennessee Department of Children’s Services—in particular Commissioner Viola Miller and Deputy Commissioner for Protection and Prevention Bonnie Hommrich—for their assistance, cooperation, and reflection in the preparation of this report. We would like to acknowledge the Technical Assistance Committee and their contributions to this effort. We are grateful for their leadership in exploring issues important to those who try to improve the safety and well-being of children. We would also like to thank Ada Skyles and Mark Courtney for their helpful comments.

Prepared for: Tennessee Department of Children’s Services and Technical Assistance Committee

Prepared by: Chapin Hall Center for Children at the University of Chicago 1313 East 60th Street Chicago, IL 60637 © 2006 by Chapin Hall Center for Children A complete list of Chapin Hall publications is available at our Web site www.chapinhall.org ~ phone: 773/753-5900 ~ fax: 773/753-5940 CS-133 ~ ISSN: 1097-3125

ENTRY AND EXIT DISPARITIES IN THE TENNESSEE FOSTER CARE SYSTEM

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Executive Summary According to the most recent data for 2005, African American children accounted for 31 percent of foster children and only 21 percent of children in the general population of Tennessee. Compared with other states, Tennessee has a disproportionality rate that is among the lowest in the country. Nevertheless, Tennessee is a diverse state with regional and county-level differences in the use of foster care. As a result, disproportionality in some parts of the state is greater than it is in other parts. This report describes that variation in order to better understand disparities in the use of foster care and to point to strategies that may bring greater equity to the delivery of child welfare services. The study is based on Tennessee children placed in foster care between 2000 and 2005, inclusive. Children adjudicated abused, neglected, or unruly up to the age of 18 and placed in foster family care, relative homes, or group and residential care are included. The analysis is divided into two parts. The first part focuses on entry rates and differences in the likelihood that children will enter foster care. The second part examines exit patterns in order to assess how length of stay and exit type (e.g., reunification or adoption) influence disproportionality overall.

Entry Dynamics The likelihood of entry into foster care is measured as the number of admissions per 1,000 children in the general population. In Tennessee, placement rates reveal the following: ■ Placement rates overall were higher in 2005 (3.4 per 1,000) than they were in 2000 (2.5 per 1,000). ■ The rate of placement for white children increased by 41 percent (the largest increase recorded), compared to increases of 19 percent and 29 percent for African Americans and Hispanics, respectively. ■ Measured as the ratio of two rates, the disparity rate in 2005 for African American children relative to white children was 1.2. For Hispanic children, the rate was 1.4. Disparity rates in 2000 were slightly higher.

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■

■

■

■

■

■


Placement rates are significantly higher for children under the age of 1, regardless of race and ethnicity. African American children under the age of 1 are the children most likely to enter care. The disparity rates for African American infants and African American teenagers are larger than the disparity rates for children of other ages. Rates of placement vary significantly by region. Specifically, because more than 50 percent of all African American children placed in foster care in 2005 were from either the Davidson or Shelby regions, the experiences of African American children in those counties influence the profile of the state as a whole. In Shelby, the overall rate of placement is among the lowest in the state, but the rate of disparity is the second-highest. Compared with the rest of the state, the Knox region has an average rate of placement and the highest disparity rate. The East Tennessee region has high overall rates of placement but the lowest disparity rate in Tennessee. The rate of placement among whites in East Tennessee is the highest in the state, measured at the regional level.

In addition to these basic data, the report also examines how entry rate disparities at the county level vary in relation to characteristics of the local population. Data used for this portion of the study consisted of population data from the 2000 census. Results from this analysis, although tentative, provide potentially useful insights. First, counties with a larger proportion of African American families did not have systematically higher entry rate disparities. Second, in counties with a higher proportion of female-headed families, disparity rates tended to be smaller. The same was true in counties with larger populations of adults with less than a high school education. In other words, African American placement rates were closer to the white placement rates in counties with higher concentrations of female-headed families and adults without a high school degree.


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Exit Patterns The second piece of analysis examined whether time spent in foster care and the probability of exit differ depending on race, age, and region where the family lives. We followed all children placed in foster care between 2001 and 2005 through the end of 2005. Results point to the following: ■ African American children stay longer in foster care. ■ Children who enter foster care as babies tend to stay longer, but African American babies stay longer than white babies. ■ Regional patterns follow the overall pattern, for the most part. However, in some regions, African American children do not stay longer than white children. Shelby is a prime example. ■ Why children leave foster care is important. For children who are either reunified or adopted, white children exit more quickly. Among children discharged to a relative’s care, African American children move more quickly. ■ The type of placement is important as are the reasons why children leave foster care. Children placed with relatives stay longer.

Recommendations African American children are overrepresented in Tennessee’s foster care system. Entry and exit rate disparities account for why there are more African American children in foster care than white children, but patterns in the underlying data connect disparity to age- and place-specific risks. With these patterns in mind, targeted investments may help reduce disparity. As a starting point, African American babies are the children with the highest placement risk. If the connection to female-headed households is real, it may be that better support for single parents with very young children would reduce placement rates and benefit African American families in particular. Shelby and Davidson counties place more African American babies and have relatively high rates of disparity, so both counties may be candidates for interventions that provide resources that support parents. Knox region is another area that warrants further attention for the same reasons. Any given policy or practice option has to be evaluated within the broader context of entry and exit disparities. The use of relatives as foster care providers and discharge resources is emblematic of a potential quandary. African American

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children consistently stay longer in care than white children. Solutions should target ways of moving African American children to permanency faster. At the same time, we found that African American children placed with relatives leave foster care more slowly when relatives are the discharge resource. Although relative care is generally preferable to other placement types, all things being equal, the data suggest that increased use of relative care may actually extend length of stay for African American children. It is important to be cognizant to these linkages so that when entry and exit patterns change, we understand how pursuit of one goal affects other goals.


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Introduction In Tennessee, 31 percent of the children in foster care are African American although African American children make up only 21 percent of the children statewide. In other words the ratio of African American to white children in foster care is 1.5 to one, which means that African American children are overrepresented. Compared with other states, Tennessee has a disproportionality rate that is among the lowest in the country.1 Nevertheless, there are parts of Tennessee where the disproportionality rate differs substantially from what is true statewide. In this paper, we aim to describe sub-state patterns of disproportionality and to understand why, relatively speaking, there are more African American children in foster care than white children. To accomplish this objective, we address a series of fundamental empirical questions. For a population of children in foster care, disproportionality (for any subgroup) arises whenever the admission/discharge equilibrium differs for one group of children from the equilibrium observed for another group. If children from one subgroup enter care in greater numbers and/or stay longer than children from another, representation for those groups will not reflect their underlying population proportions. One key to understanding disproportionality and its connection to equity is to understand the relative contribution of entry and exit dynamics. Our paper is organized into two primary sections. In the first, we consider entry dynamics, with a specific focus on rates of entry into care for groups of children defined by their age and their race. The entry rate, measured as the number of children entering care given the number of children in the general population, measures the probability of placement. For most manifestations, differential treatment of African American children will show up as differences in the rate of entry into care per unit population. The disparity in admission rates is expressed as a ratio between two rates (i.e., the relative rates). The analysis we present examines entry disparities over place and time for different subgroups of children. We also connect levels of disparity to county-level variation in the background population. 1 Disproportionality

rates by state range from 1.56 to 5.46, with Tennessee’s rate listed as 1.77, according to the Center for the Study of Social Policy. The Center’s full report is available at: http://www.cssp.org/uploadFiles/factSheet1.pdf. The rate for Tennessee cited in that report differs somewhat from the rate reported here because this analysis is limited to the population of children defined by the Brian A. settlement. That group of children includes children of all ages who were adjudicated abused, neglected, or unruly. Delinquents are not counted as part of this report.

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The second section of the paper deals with exit dynamics. For the foster care population, exit dynamics are connected to two basic phenomena: placement duration and exit type. Policy generally organizes the decisions made on behalf of foster children into those that govern how long children will be in care and those that are organized around why children leave care. Duration and exit type are inextricably linked in that some exit types take longer on average to complete. Adoption is the most obvious example. Although some children are adopted soon after they enter the foster care system, adoption usually takes longer to complete because such exit options as reunification have to be ruled out first. The role of exit dynamics on the overall population equilibrium depends on the balance of exit types in relation to the total number of children admitted. In turn, if some groups of children are more likely to be reunified, then rates of reunification will factor into the level of disparity observed at any given point in time.

Terms Our use of the term disproportionality refers to one population that is out of proportion with respect to an appropriate reference population. In this paper, the reference population used for the comparisons is the population of all Tennessee children under the age of 18, as counted in the 2000 census of the United States. We also use census estimates for 2005 for some portions of the analysis. The population is divided into racial and ethnic groups; the population proportion for African American children is simply the total number of African American children divided by the total number of children. The same calculation is used to derive the proportion of white children and the proportion of Hispanic children. The comparison population consists of children in foster care. We count the number of children in foster care on a given day to derive the population of children in foster care. We then calculate the proportion of white, African American, and Hispanic children in the manner used for the general population. Disproportionality arises whenever the proportion of one group in the comparison population (i.e., foster children) is either proportionally larger (overrepresentation) or smaller (underrepresentation) than in the general population. As already noted, 31 percent of the children in foster care in Tennessee are African American whereas only 21 percent of the general population is African American. In general, we are trying to account for why African American children are overrepresented. Disparity means a lack of equality. Equality in this case refers to the likelihood of placement into foster care, the likelihood of exit from foster care, and the time

Disproportionality arises whenever the proportion of one group in the comparison population (i.e., foster children) is either proportionally larger (overrepresentation) or smaller (underrepresentation) than in the general population.


Disparity means a lack of equality. Equality in this case refers to the likelihood of placement into foster care, the likelihood of exit from foster care, and the time needed to leave foster care.

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needed to leave foster care. We use the rate of first entry into foster care per 1,000 children in the general population to describe the likelihood of placement. The likelihood of exit from foster care is measured by dividing exits from foster care by the total number of children admitted. Because all children eventually leave foster care, which means that the likelihood of exit is 100 percent if sufficient time has passed, we also consider the likelihood of exit, by exit type (e.g., reunification and adoption). Last, we calculate the time needed to leave the system. For this measure, we use the median duration. We also calculate the rate of exit, a measure that substitutes for average length of stay, the more conventional measure of time in care. We chose the rate of exit because the statistical properties are more flexible than the average length of stay. Our analysis of disparity examines whether children of different races and ethnicities are equally likely to enter foster care, equally likely to leave foster care, and equally likely to leave foster care one way or another. Again, disproportionality is a function of disparity in the entry and exit process. For this reason, we seek to understand differences in the likelihood of entry and the likelihood of exit in order that we may account for the observed disproportionality in Tennessee.

The Likelihood of Admission With respect to the likelihood of admission, we start with four basic questions: 1. Are African American children more likely to enter foster care than white children? 2. Is the disparity between African American and white admission rates more pronounced for some age groups? 3. Is the level of disparity consistent across the state of Tennessee? 4. How does the observed variation in entry disparity vary with respect to the characteristics of the local population? We hypothesize that placement risk varies by race and that this variation is more prominent among certain age groups and in certain parts of the state. We also speculate that attributes of the local population are connected to disparity in ways that may offer clues about how resources designed to alleviate disparity may be targeted. We study first-time placements in foster care between 2000 and 2005. Limiting the population to first-time entries manages the problem of overrepresenting children who reentered foster care over the study period. Because a large number of counties

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have relatively few children admitted to foster care, we study admissions over a 6-year period in order to stabilize the entry rate calculations. We exclude children adjudicated delinquent. We report basic descriptive statistics for Hispanics, but we do not include them in the regional or county-level tables because there are relatively few Hispanic children in the smaller parts of the state. Population characteristics from the 2000 census used to describe the county population include: ■ % of the population living in an urban area ■ % of the population classified as African American alone ■ % of families with own children under 18 headed by a single female ■ % of the population 25 years and older with less than a high school diploma

The Likelihood of Exit and Placement Duration We study exit dynamics by answering three additional questions. They are the following: 1. Does duration in care vary by race? 2. Does the probability of exit vary by race? 3. What other factors affect the rate of exit, and do these factors further clarify how race and ethnicity influence how and when children leave the foster care system? For this portion of the analysis, we study all children placed in foster care between 2001 and 2005. We follow these children through December 31, 2005, a 5-year observation window. We calculate the rate of exit by exit type, entry year, race, and the number of years in care, and measure duration in care by entry year, race, age group, and region. We use Cox proportional hazard models to estimate the effects of entry year, race, age at entry, predominant placement type, and region on the exit rate. Next, we examine the duration component. We focus on the differential experiences of children while in care and as they exit care. Age at entry to foster care is an important explanatory factor in the experiences children have both in care and how, when, and where they exit. Our analysis considers the extent to which differences in race have an additional effect on outcomes. Similarly, we know that type of exit is related to duration in care prior to exit. Taking this into account, our analysis considers the extent to which race differences alter this expected effect.


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Findings Basic Population Data Basic population data for all children in Tennessee and all foster children are presented in Table 1. In 2005, estimates put the number of children under age 18 at just under 1.4 million. Of these children, 71 percent are white, 21 percent are African American, and 4 percent are Hispanic. For foster children, whites make up 60 percent of the total population, African Americans represent 31 percent of the total, and Hispanics constitute 8 percent. The higher concentration of African American and Hispanic children among foster children represents the basic disproportionality.

Table 1: Number of Children in the General Population and Number of Foster Children by Race and Ethnicity: 2005

Race and Ethnicity

Number (N) Foster Children Children

Percent (%) Foster Children Children

Total*

1,396,963

4,743

100

100

African American

295,049

1,134

21

31

White

993,221

3,121

71

60

Hispanic

50,364

220

4

8

*Total includes children not listed separately. Source: Counts of children in the general population are projections by Claritas, Inc. based on Census 2000, Summary File 2. Counts of foster children are from Tennessee Department of Children’s Services, TnKids Database, as of February 13, 2006.

Entry Dynamics Table 2 shows the number of children placed for the first time between 2000 and 2005 by race. White children make up two-thirds of placements and African American children account for an additional 25 percent. Hispanics make up a small proportion of first placements. At the time of admission, there are relatively fewer African American children when compared with the proportion of African American children counted as part of foster care population. This finding alone suggests that exit dynamics play a crucial role in disproportionality in Tennessee.


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Table 2: First Admissions to Foster Care by Race and Ethnicity and Year: 2000 - 2005 2004 5,045 1,212 254 3,338

2005 4,743 1,134 220 3,121

100% 28% 4%

Number (N) 2002 2003 3,918 4,788 961 1,244 168 226 2,649 3,116 Percent (%) 100% 100% 25% 26% 4% 5%

100% 24% 5%

100% 24% 5%

64%

68%

66%

66%

Race and Ethnicity Total* African American Hispanic White

2000 3,504 990 131 2,264

2001 3,797 1,060 142 2,422

Total* African American Hispanic

100% 28% 4%

White

65%

65%

*Total includes children not listed separately. Source: Counts of foster children are from Tennessee Department of Children’s Services, TnKids Database, as of February 13, 2006. The likelihood of placement, measured as the number of children placed per 1,000 children in the population, is presented in Table 3. Overall, placement rates increased for children of all races and ethnicities over the period between 2000 and 2005, from 2.5 placements per 1,000 children to 3.4 placements, respectively. The increase in rates was most pronounced for white children for whom the likelihood of entering foster care increased by 41 percent. The comparable figure for African Americans was 19 percent and for Hispanics it was 29 percent.


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Table 3: Number of Children Admitted for the First Time, Number of Tennessee Children, and the Placement Rate per 1,000 Children: 2000 and 2005 Race and Ethnicity Total African American Hispanic White

Admissions 2000 2005 3,504 4,743 990 1,134 131 220 2,264 3,121

Child Population 2000 2005 1,398,521 1,396,963 307,040 295,049 38,710 50,364 1,021,195 993,221

Rate per 1,000 2000 2005 2.5 3.4 3.2 3.8 3.4 4.4 2.2 3.1

Change '00 to '05 36% 19% 29% 41%

Source: Counts of foster children are from Tennessee Department of Children’s Services, TnKids Database, as of February 13, 2006. 2000 counts of children in the general population are from the 2000 U.S. Census, Summary File 2. 2005 counts of children in the general population are projections by Claritas, Inc. based on Census 2000, Summary File 2. The relative placement rate expresses the difference between two rates as a ratio. In Table 4, the statewide relative rates for African Americans to whites and Hispanics to whites are presented. These data indicate that compared to whites, the relative rate of entry into foster care in 2000 for African American and Hispanic children was comparable. For every white child placed per 1,000 children, 1.5 African American children and 1.5 Hispanic children were placed. As shown in Table 4, the relative rates dropped in 2005 because the rate of placement for white children increased the most.

Table 4: Relative Placement Rates by Race and Ethnicity and Year Comparison African American to White Hispanic to White Source: Table 3.

2000

2005

1.5 1.5

1.2 1.4


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Age and Region In this section, we use age at admission and region to build on the analysis presented thus far. Age is important because research consistently shows that the risk of placement is closely associated with age. Region, which is the Department of Children’s Services (DCS) administrative region with operating responsibility for the county where a child was living at the time of placement, is important because children of color tend to live in Tennessee’s urban areas. At the state level, disparity is relatively modest; the regional data point to places in Tennessee where disparity rates are higher. Taken together, both factors deepen our understanding how entry dynamics relate to disproportionality from the statewide perspective.

Table 5: Number of First Admissions and Rate of Admission by Race and Ethnicity and Age Group: 2005 Race Total* African American Hispanic White

Total 4,743 1,134 220 3,121

Age 0 739 186 37 450

Total* African American Hispanic

3.5 3.8 4.4

10.1 11.6 9.3

Number (N) Ages 1-5 1,204 254 67 791 Rate per 1,000 3.3 3.1 4.0

White

3.1

8.5

3.0

Ages 6-12 1,111 266 40 744

Ages 13-17 1,689 428 76 1,136

2.1 2.2 2.2

4.4 5.4 6.7

1.9

3.9

*Total includes children not listed separately. Source: Counts of foster children are from Tennessee Department of Children’s Services, TnKids Database, as of February 13, 2006. Counts of children in the general population are projections by Claritas, Inc. based on Census 2000, Summary File 2. Starting with age, Table 5 shows that the placement rate in 2005 is highest for children under the age of 1 at the time of admission. Across the state of Tennessee, the children most likely to enter foster care are African American infants. The second-most-likely group to enter care is adolescents. As shown in Figure 1, the underlying risk pattern is quite stable. Regardless of race or ethnicity, babies are the children with the highest placement risk, followed by adolescents. That said, among adolescents and children between the ages of 1 and 5, Hispanics have the highest placement rates.


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Figure 1: Rate of First Admissions by Age Group and Race and Ethnicity: 2005 Rate per 1,000 Children

12 10 8 Hispanic

6

Black 4

White

2 0 Age 0

Ages 1-5

Ages 6-12

Ages 13-17

Source: Table 5. The data in Table 6 show the number of children placed in foster care for the first time by race, the number of children in the population by race, and the percentage of children living in each region by race.2 These data are designed to highlight the following. First, slightly more than half of all African American children live in either Shelby (49%) or Davidson (15%). Hamilton, Mid-Cumberland, and Southwest regions are the next-largest regions with respect to the proportion of African American children, but each region has less than 10 percent of the total number of African American children. Second, although Shelby is the largest region in the state, with 18 percent of all children living within its borders, it has the fourth-largest number of admissions to foster care. More specifically, children from the East Tennessee, Northeast, and Upper Cumberland regions are overrepresented among children first entering foster care in 2005, whereas children from the Mid-Cumberland and Shelby regions are underrepresented. The within-region distribution of white and African American children is also displayed in Table 6. These data indicate that the statewide data reported in Table 2 are influenced to a large extent by placement patterns at the regional level. At the state level, 24 percent of all first admissions in 2005 involved an African American child, a figure that is only slightly higher than the percentage of African American children in the general population. At the regional level, the admission disparities are more striking. Again, Shelby region stands out. In 2005, 82 percent of the admissions in Shelby involved African American children despite the fact that, as noted below, 59 percent of all children in Shelby are African American. 2 At

this point in the presentation, data for Hispanic children are no longer presented because the number of Hispanic children in any given region is quite small.


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Table 6: Number of First Admissions and Child Population by Region and Race: 2005 Region

Admissions African Total* American

Child Population African Total* American

White

Total Davidson East Tennessee Hamilton Knox Mid-Cumberland Northeast Northwest Shelby South Central Southeast Southwest Upper Cumberland

4,743 445 851 193 292 625 505 206 447 272 263 262 382

1,134 228 23 76 87 93 30 36 367 45 15 115 19

3,121 145 749 95 164 438 427 146 60 199 232 136 330

1,396,963 128,759 153,338 69,239 86,244 240,625 100,329 56,054 248,391 86,580 69,824 87,743 69,837

295,049 45,526 3,725 18,226 9,710 24,422 2,924 8,111 145,973 6,564 2,861 25,766 1,241

993,221 63,063 139,322 45,786 70,525 195,705 92,262 44,744 83,657 73,579 62,805 57,519 64,254


100% 9% 18% 4% 6% 13% 11% 4% 9% 6% 6% 6% 8%

100% 20% 2% 7% 8% 8% 3% 3% 32% 4% 1% 10% 2%

100% 5% 24% 3% 5% 14% 14% 5% 2% 6% 7% 4% 11%

100% 9% 11% 5% 6% 17% 7% 4% 18% 6% 5% 6% 5%

100% 15% 1% 6% 3% 8% 1% 3% 49% 2% 1% 9% 0%

100% 6% 14% 5% 7% 20% 9% 5% 8% 7% 6% 6% 6%


100% 100% 100% 100% 100% 100% 100% 100% 100% 100% 100% 100% 100%

24% 51% 3% 39% 30% 15% 6% 17% 82% 17% 6% 44% 5%

66% 33% 88% 49% 56% 70% 85% 71% 13% 73% 88% 52% 86%

100% 100% 100% 100% 100% 100% 100% 100% 100% 100% 100% 100% 100%

21% 35% 2% 26% 11% 10% 3% 14% 59% 8% 4% 29% 2%

71% 49% 91% 66% 82% 81% 92% 80% 34% 85% 90% 66% 92%

*Total includes Hispanics and children of other races not shown separately. Source: Counts of foster children are from Tennessee Department of Children’s Services, TnKids Database, as of February 13, 2006. Counts of children in the general population are projections by Claritas, Inc. based on Census 2000, Summary File 2.

White


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The data in Table 7 shed further light on the entry rate disparities within Tennessee. These data show the rate of first entry into care by region and race and the rate for African American children relative to white children. First reported in Table 4, the African American placement rate relative to the white rate is 1.2 for the state as a whole. However, it is important to note that the regional data show more pronounced disparities. For example, in East Tennessee, the region with the highest overall placement rate, the disparity between the African American and white rates is the smallest. In Shelby, the region with the largest number of African American children and the lowest overall placement rate, the relative rate is 3.5, which is the second-widest gap in the state. However, the rate of placement for both white and African American children in Shelby is the lowest among all the regions. The low overall rate of placement does tend to influence the statewide data given that nearly 50 percent of all African American children live in Shelby. For the Knox region, the relative rate was 3.9, which suggests that after adjusting for the size of each population, there were nearly four African American children placed for every white child placed. The relative rates are lowest in East Tennessee, Northwest, and Southeast regions.

Table 7: Rate of First Admission per 1,000 Children by Race and Region: 2005 Rate per 1,000 Children

Region Total East Tennessee Upper Cumberland Northeast Southeast Northwest Davidson Knox South Central Southwest Hamilton Mid-Cumberland Shelby

Total*

African American

White

Relative Rate

3.4 5.5 5.5 5.0 3.8 3.7 3.5 3.4 3.1 3.0 2.8 2.6 1.8

3.8 6.2 15.3 10.3 5.2 4.4 5.0 9.0 6.9 4.5 4.2 3.8 2.5

3.1 5.4 5.1 4.6 3.7 3.3 2.3 2.3 2.7 2.4 2.1 2.2 0.7

1.2 1.1 3.0 2.2 1.4 1.4 2.2 3.9 2.5 1.9 2.0 1.7 3.5

*Total includes Hispanics and other children not shown separately. Source: Rates are based on counts of children in the general population as projected by Claritas, Inc., derived from Census 2000, Summary File 2, and counts of first foster care admissions derived from Tennessee Department of Children’s Services, TnKids Database, as of February 13, 2006.


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Figure 2 displays regional placement rates for African American and white children side by side, sorted from left to right by the rate of placement for African American children. These data highlight the fact that in every region, the rate of placement is greater for African American children than for white children and that entry rate disparities are greater in some regions than in others. Finally, the data suggest that placement rates for whites tend to be higher in the regions with higher overall African American placement rates. This latter point raises the possibility that placement rates are generally associated with underlying social conditions within the regions.

Figure 2: Rate of First Admissions by Region and Race: 2005 Rate per 1,000 Children 16 14 12 10 8 6 4 Black

2

White

Regional placement rates by age are presented in Table 8. These data do not differ from patterns already described. In general, regions with higher overall placement rates have higher age-specific placement rates. For example, the East Tennessee and Upper Cumberland regions have the highest total placement rate as well as the highest placement rates for each of the age groups. The one exception is Knox. The infant placement rate is higher in Knox than it is in any other region, even though the total placement rate is in the mid-range. The difference is accounted for by the fact that Knox has an adolescent placement rate that is among the lowest in the state.

Shelby

Regions are ranked in order of the African American admission rate. Source: Table 7.

Mid-Cumberland

Hamilton

Northwest

Southwest

Davidson

Southeast

East Tennessee

South Central

Knox

Regions

Northeast

Upper Cumberlan

0


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Table 8: Rate of First Admissions by Region and Age Group: 2005 Region Total East Tennessee Upper Cumberland Northeast Southeast Northwest Davidson Knox South Central Southwest Hamilton Mid-Cumberland Shelby

Total

Age 0

Ages 1-5

Ages 6-12

Ages 13-17

3.4 5.5 5.5 5.0 3.8 3.7 3.5 3.4 3.1 3.0 2.8 2.6 1.8

9.6 15.5 15.7 15.9 9.4 6.9 8.9 16.1 7.5 8.0 8.9 6.4 5.8

3.2 5.4 6.6 4.6 4.1 3.8 2.5 3.6 3.0 3.0 2.4 2.3 1.4

2.0 3.7 3.1 3.5 2.1 2.3 1.9 1.9 1.9 1.9 1.5 1.5 1.0

4.3 6.4 5.7 5.7 4.6 4.8 5.6 2.8 4.2 3.4 3.8 3.7 2.6

Source: Rates are based on counts of children in the general population as projected by Claritas, Inc., derived from Census 2000, Summary File 2, and counts of first foster care admissions derived from Tennessee Department of Children’s Services, TnKids Database, as of February 13, 2006.

Entry Rate Disparities in Context The data in Table 7 and Figure 2 point to variation in the level of disparity at the regional level, suggesting that to the extent disparities arise from the differential treatment of African American children relative to white children, the underlying processes are not uniform across the state. To better understand where in Tennessee disparity is greater, we analyzed variation in the relative rate of entry for African American and white children together with local population attributes to determine whether a pattern emerges. Our approach is exploratory in that our models include only population-level characteristics.3 Initial analyses conducted at the regional level revealed that twelve regions are too few, so we switched to counties as the unit of analysis. Detailed county data are presented in the Appendix. Moreover, because many rural counties have very small African American populations, we removed from the analysis

3 In

this regard, we want to point out the following: First, we do not include other variables that might account for county-wide variations in the use of foster care, such as the supply of foster homes, workforce capacity, and other features of the system. Second, county-level results cannot be used to draw inferences about relationships at the individual level. That is, the results presented cannot be used to say, for example, that children from female-headed households are more likely to be placed. Finally, it is also important to note that counties are but one level of aggregation. It may be that when data are organized at lower levels of aggregation (e.g., zip codes or census tracts), the relationships observed at the county level will change.

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twenty-nine counties with fewer than 100 African American children.4 Of the sixty-five counties used in the analysis, Davidson, Hamilton, Knox, Madison, and Shelby reported the largest number of admissions involving African American children. Except for Madison, those counties also have the largest number of African American children and relatively high entry rate disparities. A summary of out analysis is presented in Table 9. To restate the rationale, the goal is to understand where disparity rates tend to be higher so that resources aimed at reducing disparity may be targeted. The data presented suggest that the state’s primary urban area (Shelby) is related to greater placement rate disparity, and counties with more adults lacking a high school diploma and with more single female-headed households are associated with less placement rate disparity.5 That is, disparity rates tend to be lower in places with more families that have limited resources (i.e., human/social capital), a sign that regardless of race, singleparent families with fewer resources may be treated differently. Given that African American children are more likely to live in single-parent families, family structure may be one reason African American children are more likely to enter placement. Finally, the concentration of residents that are African American did not influence the level of disparity in a statistically significant way, although it may be that any influence the concentration of African American residents has on disparity is more readily observed at the sub-county level.

4 In addition to removing some counties with small African American populations, we also modified

the variable used to represent the proportion of the population that is African American because the distribution is not normal (i.e., there are a few counties with large populations of African Americans and many counties with small populations.) The transformation we applied preserves some of the assumptions needed to use a regression model, but it does mean that the coefficient associated with percent of families that are African American is not directly interpretable. Because the proportion of African Americans does not contribute to the model, the loss of interpretability is not particularly important. Also, Shelby is a high-leverage point in the data, so we adjusted specifically for Shelby County. Finally, we adjusted the standard errors to reflect differences in the size of the county populations, an adjustment that did not alter the results reported in Table 9. 5 To

further understand the data, we grouped counties based on the proportion of African American and white families headed by females (using standard scores). In counties with above average proportions of female-headed families (both African American and white), the average disparity rate was 1.7; the comparable figure for counties with below average proportions (i.e., fewer single-parent families) was 2.1. The data for adults with less than a high school education followed the same pattern. Counties with more undereducated adults (African American and white) had an average disparity rate of 1.6; for counties with fewer undereducated adults, the disparity rate was 2.2.


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Table 9: Regression Model of Disparity between the African American and White Placement Rate (2000-2005) and County Population Attributes Variable Intercept Primary Urban (Shelby)* % Less than High School** % Single Female-Headed Households* % African American Residents R-Squared Number of Observations

b 4.44 2.52 -5.04 -8.68 15.76

se 0.62 0.92 1.67 3.31 10.31

0.32 65

*p