The number of youth in foster dropped by 6.9% in 2023, according to new federal data released late last week.
There were 343,077 youth in foster care on the last day of September, according to the Adoption and Foster Care Analysis and Reporting System, or AFCARS, which is the collection process by which state information on the nation’s foster care systems flows up to the federal Administration for Children and Families (ACF). That is 21% less than the most recent peak of 437,010 in 2018.
The consistent downward slope has been driven by lower entries into the system, even as exits from foster care have slowed somewhat. There were 175,283 entries in 2023, a decrease of 6.1% from the previous year.
The federally collected numbers do not include family separation through what has come to be known as hidden foster care, whereby the physical custody of a child changes without any court involvement or former petition for removal in court. There is a growing body of research suggesting that this occurs hundreds of thousands of times every year.
The Trump administration announced the decline in a press release promoting a more detailed release of foster care data this week in the form of a new interactive dashboard meant to improve the ability to view and share AFCARS information.
“By making this data more accessible in a user-friendly format, we are collectively better able to understand the foster care landscape and what our children need,” said Andrew Gradison, acting assistant secretary for ACF.
According to the press release, the new dashboard and related processes will enable quicker release of AFCARS reports, which drag woefully behind present day. It will now be updated with “prior year data in May of the subsequent fiscal year,” per the release. If Youth Services Insider is reading that right, this means the report for 2024 should follow sometime soon if the administration is hoping to release the 2025 figures in May of 2026.
The new dashboard will appear here starting on May 13. A webinar on using the dashboard will take place that day at 12:15 p.m. eastern time.
Gradison noted the decline in foster care, but stopped short of celebrating it, saying “we will celebrate reduced numbers of children in foster care only when we see corresponding indicators of improved child safety. The only true measure of success is fewer children harmed by abuse and neglect.”
We are assuming there will be further comments made upon the full release of AFCARS that might indicate what Gradison is referring to, because his agency does measure how many children are harmed by abuse and neglect each year, in a report called Child Maltreatment. The number of confirmed victims of abuse and neglect identified in the 2023 report was 546,159, a record low and a 19% decline over five years.
