Alia UnSystem Innovation Cohort

From 2018 to 2021, the Alia UnSystem Innovation Cohort jurisdictions committed themselves to a shared aspiration, making big and small changes toward creating systems where:

Ten public child welfare agency leaders representing 5 jurisdictions and 14 counties were selected in 2017 to participate based on their commitment to family-honoring practice and their ability to redesign their systems. Juridistictions included Cass County Human Services (ND), Eastern Iowa Service Area (IA), Eau Claire County Human Services (WI), Waupaca County Human Services (WI), and Washington County Human Services (MD).

Process & outcomes

Each jurisdiction was paired with one professional and one lived experience guide. The guides were crucial to the process and brought broad and deep expertise of the child welfare system from inside and out, with professional and sometimes overlapping personal experience. Their contributions offered the needed bookends of our systems change perspective – from the widest view historically and geographically, to the most intimate and personal.

Team Alia, the Cohort agency leaders, and every Cohort guide committed to bringing UnSystem concepts, principles, and practices to reality on an agency and community-wide level. Over three years of practice and monthly meetings (including during the COVID-19 lock-down), here is what they achieved for the kids and families in their jurisdictions: