
Using data to solve child welfare's toughest challenges
Leadership Fellows is a data leadership program that educates and empowers local child welfare staff across the state in order to increase positive outcomes for children and families.
The program provides the child welfare workforce with the skills, resources and support to strengthen Continuous Quality Improvement (CQI) through data mining, analysis, research, planning, project development, evaluation, communication, brainstorming and effective use of technology.

An investment in time that delivers real-world results
Leadership Fellows is designed to accommodate a child welfare employee's busy schedule. Over six months, participants commit to a day of classroom instruction and a day of coaching focused on their office's challenges. Learning in strengthened via web-based lessons. The program is designed for the child welfare professional who enjoys meeting challenges, facilitating problem solving, and getting to results.
Our Mission
To promote a data-driven and results-oriented protective services process to support children and strengthen families.
Goal
The program is firmly grounded in the values of the child welfare agency with a workforce committed to the goals of helping children and their families. We are committed to finding solutions to some of our most persistent problems—both internal and external to the organization.
Vision
We envision a statewide network of child welfare professionals skilled in data analysis, working together, sharing strategies, and overcoming challenges. We envision offices that have the capacity to best serve their communities.

Four components provide personalized instruction and accommodate a busy workforce
Classroom Instruction
Multimedia presentations plus large and small group discussions to provide opportunities to learn, share, debate, role play and dialogue. The activities promote empowerment, nurture creativity and strengthen critical thinking.
Coaching
Participants receive coaching focused on identifying problems and building skills needed to initiate and strengthen CQI. Coaching provides technical assistance in data analysis, research, software, technology, capacity-building, group facilitation and communication.
Web-Based Lessons + Resources
The Leadership Fellows website provides participants with lessons, links to data, access to research and all the tools and virtual training needed to support a data-driven, results-oriented process.
Sharing + Projects
Participants choose a challenge to solve with ongoing support from the instructors. Participants are given the tools to share all aspects of the program, including the development of the local data-driven projects, with their office.

Education continues online with a learning management system
The web-based learning management system provides unique features to strengthen all aspects of CQI including: project management, assessment, planning, data-informed action, evaluation, policy and program research. The website allows the participant to continue learning in their present work environment and supports the blended learning approach, combining web-based instruction and classroom experiences. Web-based instruction supports participants with different learning styles and levels of interest.
State-of-the-art features:
- Six lessons on key topic areas
- Multimedia to reinforce topics
- Links to data and research
- Infographics to illustrate key concepts
- Guide to data mining and analysis
- Guide to policy, protocol and program research
- Training materials for local office staff
- Comments and feedback features
- Post-lesson surveys
- Teleconferencing with instructors
- Complete course curricula
- Evaluation tools and procedures
To learn more about the evaluation of the program, go to: Leadership Fellows Evaluation.

We Empower Institutional Change
Hover over the course topics below for more details on lesson content:
Begin Continuous Quality Improvement (CQI) Process
Assess Workflow Strengths and Challenges
Exploring Research and Data Sources
Plan with Logic + Research
Test a Hypothesis + Collect Evidence
Facilitate Change with Communication and Technology
Leadership Fellows focuses on quality improvement and reaching measurable and meaningful goals in all areas related to meeting our children's and families' needs.

Instructors and coaches understand the power of research and technology
Dominic Cappello (Developer and Instructor) is the co-founder of Safety+Success Communities — a socially-engaged design and strategic planning non-profit collective. He began his work in public service as a health educator in Seattle's Juvenile Detention Facility and youth group residential homes. He worked for the NM Department of Health's Epidemiology and Response Division and the NM Protective Services-Research, Assessment and Data Bureau. His training and curricula development clients include Casey Family Programs, Annie E. Casey Foundation, Rhode Island Department of Health, National Education Association and Navaho Nation. He has a Master of Arts in Liberal Studies with an emphasis in Language and Communication from Regis University. Dominic is the creator of the Ten Talks book series on family safety that gained a national audience when he appeared on the Oprah Winfrey Show. He's also the co-author (with Katherine Ortega Courtney, PhD) of Anna, Age Eight: The data-driven prevention of childhood trauma and maltreatment. Dominic oversaw the development of the Leadership Fellows programs in New York City, Connecticut and New Mexico. He's now leading the design of the nation's first data-driven and cross-sector Adverse Childhood Experiences (ACEs) prevention program called Resilience Leaders in New Mexico and Kentucky.
Jacki Hoover, LSW, (co-facilitator and content expert) has over 20 years of experience in Child Welfare. She is the Deputy Director at Allegheny County Children Youth and Families. Hoover has worked extensively with various family engagement strategies targeting system integration Some previous positions include the manager of the Teaming Institute, Independent living supervisor and Manager Family Group Manager. Areas of expertise include transition age youth, physical well-being for children in foster care, building community/natural resources and case planning for multi-system children and families. Hoover earned a bachelor’s of social work from Slippery Rock University and a Masters in Social Work from the University of Pittsburgh. She was also an adjunct professor in the University of Pittsburgh’s Graduate School of Social Work.
Sarah Marker (Coordinator) graduated from the University of Pittsburgh with a MS in Applied Developmental Psychology with a focus on Program Design & Leadership and Behavioral Health. Sarah is also a Georgetown Fellow and graduate of the 3rd cohort of Allegheny County’s Leadership Fellows program. Her career at CYF spans a 975 hours internship, 4 years as a Caseworker at NRO, 7 years as a KIDS Specialist and over a year as the Business Operations Specialist. In her current role, Sarah’s function is to support what is needed to make CYF run as a company. This includes work on hiring/retention, standardization of processes, liaison to other DHS Offices, among a plethora of other duties. Sarah is and has been a member of various workgroups and committees, with focuses ranging from education to dually involved youth to implementing technology.
Katie Arvay (Fellows Program Manager) is a graduate of Washington University in St. Louis with a B.A. in psychology and Spanish. In 2009, she graduated from the University of Pittsburgh with a Master of Social Work in Community Organizing and Social Administration from the School of Social Work and a Master of Public Administration in Public and Nonprofit Management from the Graduate School of Public and International Affairs. She joined DHS in 2008 as an intern in the Executive Office and then spent six years in the Office of Data Analysis, Research and Evaluation as a Quality Improvement Specialist. During that time, she was a coach for the first cohort of Leadership Fellows in 2014 – 2015. In 2016 she joined the Office of Children, Youth and Families as a Child Welfare Practice Analyst. In this role, she is responsible for assisting staff in using and understanding data and assisting in connecting data to practice. She has served as a lead for DHS’ predictive analytics work as implemented in CYF’s call screening unit, is the lead for Safe Measures in Allegheny County and began the Child Welfare Data Review to strengthen data presentation and research skills of key leaders within CYF.
Kyle Jennison (Fellows Data Liaison) manages the Child Welfare Analytics team in DHS’ Office of Data Analysis, Research, and Evaluation (DARE). In this capacity he has had the opportunity to perform ongoing research and reporting on child welfare system dynamics in Allegheny County, and to help build and support applications and tools used by CYF staff and leadership. In recent years, his team has provided technical and analytic support in the implementation of predictive analytic tools in CYF. Prior to his work at DHS, Kyle earned his Master of Science degree in Public Policy and Management from Carnegie Mellon's Heinz College in Pittsburgh, and earned his Bachelor of Science degree from Cleveland’s Case Western Reserve University.

Q+A
ABOUT THE PROGRAM + PARTICIPANTS
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