Purpose: Permanency is the focus of key outcomes in the federal child welfare review process, and reunification is the preferred exit when possible. Any analysis of reunification is incomplete without looking at children who reenter child welfare. The current federal measure is limited in that it tracks reentry into foster care only up to 12 months after a prior episode, and does not differentiate between reentry following reunification versus other exits types (e.g., runaway). This study focuses on the risk of reentry following reunification for a first-entry cohort who reunified within one year--and compares children who reenter within 12 months with those that reenter between 12 and 24 months.

Method: This study examines all children who entered the California foster care system for the first time in 1998 and 1999 (n=60,314 Children) and who were reunified within 12 months (n=18,203 Children). Instances of reentry were documented for these children at 12 months (n=2,334 Children) and at 24 months (n=3,109 Children). A logistic regression model is used to model reentry into foster care for three subsets of children: those reentering within 12 months; those reentering between 12 and 24 months; and those reentering within 24 months. Independent variables examined include age at entry, ethnicity, entry year, county size (urban/rural/LA), type of abuse, time in care prior to reunification, last placement type prior to reentry, various poverty indicators, drug/alcohol services, and whether English is the primary language. Additionally, this study accounts for the presence of sibling groups in the data using a statistical technique that corrects for auto-correlated observations.

Results and Discussion: The results of this analysis suggest that there is a complicated interplay between race and time to reentry into foster care. Black children are more likely to reenter the child welfare system compared to White children at 12 months and at 24 months, but when examining the subset of children reentering between 12 and 24 months this racial effect does not exist. On the other hand, Native American children are much more likely to reenter care between 12 and 24 months compared to white children, but this effect is not significant when examined over the course of 12 or 24 months. Additionally, this study found that: children whose parent(s) are receiving drug and alcohol services are much more likely to reenter care regardless of the model; children coming from a single parent household are more likely to reenter care at 12 and 24 months, but not between 12 and 24 months; children whose primary language is other than English are less likely to reenter care across models; and that an increase in the entry rate at the census tract level leads to an increase in reentries across models. The results of this study suggest that there continues to be a significant number of children reentering care after 12 months post reunification. Post-reunification services need to understand the characteristics of these children and how they are the same, or differ, from children who reenter earlier (within 12 months).