Judicial, Court, and Attorney Measures of Performance (JCAMP) Volume IV: Technical Guide

Developed by the National Council of Juvenile and Family Court Judges – Capacity Building Center for Judges

Introduction

In 2021, the Children’s Bureau funded the Capacity Building Center for Courts (CBCC) to develop a set of child welfare court, judicial, and attorney performance measures through the Judicial, Court, and Attorney Measures of Performance (JCAMP) project. This volume presents profiles for each JCAMP measure with instructions for how to calculate each one. Profile sections are described in table 1.

Using This Technical Guide

Once you have selected measures, navigate to each measure’s profile to review options and instructions for data collection (e.g., administrative data, court observation). Next, review the JCAMP data collection instruments found in Volume III: Implementation Tools and decide whether to use or adapt the instruments for your data collection efforts.

The other JCAMP volumes in this series include—

• Volume I: Measures. Describes the JCAMP performance measures in five topical categories
• Volume II: Implementation Guide. Provides guidance for how to effectively implement the measures and use the data
• Volume III: Implementation Toolbox. Compiles tools for each implementation step described in Volume II, including sample data collection instruments
• Volume V: Background and Research. Describes the methods used to develop the measures and discusses supporting research evidence and best practice recommendations for each measurement category

Universal Data Elements

• Race of the child or youth. At a minimum, options for race should include American Indian or Alaska Native, Asian, Black or African American, Native Hawaiian or Other Pacific Islander, and White. Respondents should be given the option of selecting more than one race. Whenever possible, these response options should be further expanded to better capture the race of the child or youth.
• Ethnicity of the child or youth. At a minimum, options for ethnicity should include “Hispanic or Latino,” and “Not Hispanic or Latino.” Whenever possible, these response options should be further expanded to better capture the ethnicity of the child or youth.
• Age of the child or youth. Can be calculated using date of birth and reported either as a continuous variable or by age range (e.g., <1; 1–5; 6–10; 11–16; >17).
• Indian Child Welfare Act (ICWA) status of the child or youth. ICWA eligibility of the child or youth should be documented for all measures.

Collecting these data are essential to be able to disaggregate or break down the data by demographics, to explore disparate outcomes among racial and ethnic groups. Other demographic variables that may be collected to further assess equity of the system are listed below. With the exception of jurisdiction, county, or region, these data may not be regularly collected in the court record but could be collected using surveys and focus groups.

Sampling Guidance

Getting performance measurement data requires making decisions about sampling, developing, or adapting a tool or tools to collect the data needed and collecting the data needed to inform performance measurement efforts. How many cases do we need to review or observe is often one of the first question sites asked when working on a data collection plan. The answer is always a balance between the goals of the performance measurement effort and the resources the site has to collect data.

In a perfect world you would want all the data to inform your decisions. You would talk to all stakeholders, review all the files, and talk with all the parents (the entire population of interest). In the real world, this is not practical or feasible. Instead, we sample. A sample is a part or subset of the population and assumes the sample is representative (accurately reflects) of the entire population of interest.

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