Family and Child Tracking System (FACTS)
- FACTS Availabilty Report
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2000, 1st quarter (PDF Format, 4p, 16kb)
1998, 3rd quarter (PDF Format, 4p, 24kb)
In October of 1993, Public
Systems Inc. (PSI) began work with the Delaware
Department of Services for Children Youth and Their
Families (DSCYF) to develop an integrated information
system for its divisions, including the juvenile justice
organization. Using client-server technologies and a
development approach built on business process
reengineering, the Department has been able to improve
client service for juvenile offenders and integrate the
service delivery system within the Department. The
system automates all aspects of management for juvenile
corrections from screening and bail assessment through
aftercare, including a variety of secure and non-secure
placements. An essential feature of the system is the
integrated and customizable workflow manager that guides
the processing of juvenile offenders based on
organizational policy and procedure. Unlike many such
systems that are based on an adult corrections model,
this juvenile justice management system was specifically
designed to meet the needs of a juvenile population.
Features and Benefits
An important design objective of this system was to automate a better service delivery process, not just the existing process. This resulted in a system that increased efficiency through:- Automated census tracking, including room assignment and program placement;
- An on-line legal summary of each case, indicating status of charges past or pending;
- Workflow automation that eliminated steps in the client service process;
- Speeding up communications between workers through automation of workflow; and
- Electronic processing tools that help workers complete tasks in a more timely manner, such as immediate access to case records and policy information, saving hours of staff time each day.
These features allow workers to focus on casework instead of paperwork, while others focused on improving service quality through:
- Real-time case tracking, eliminating delays in obtaining case information;
- Providing information about all services to a client, increasing treatment focus while reducing redundancy and fragmentation;
- Automating the rules of service delivery, ensuring worker notification of tasks and uniform response to similar problems, and;
- Early identification of service gaps and barriers, leading to system-wide information for planning, evaluation, and benchmarking analysis.
For agency management, the system produced:
- An increase in service capacity;
- On-line case information to respond quickly and accurately to the media and elected officials concerning high profile cases;
- Historical and real-time placement information;
- Enhanced management of caseloads;
- Case documents automatically generated for court and other users;
- A reduction of the end-to-end service delivery time;
- Improved balancing of caseloads among workers;
- Better and more timely decisions based on more accurate and complete information; and
- Promotion of 'shared knowledge' between divisions resulting in increased efficiency, decision making and service goal successes.
Technical Approach
PSI used a rapid development process called "iterative development". Based on the premise that a system must be visualized before it can be realized, this process substitutes extensive user communications and prototypes of system functions for traditional requirements and design documents. A joint development team including PSI and agency staff were responsible for the analysis and development of the system using CASE (computer assisted software engineering) tools for process and data modeling. The team provides overall direction for reengineering existing processes as automated support is introduced; exploring new technologies; developing hypertext system and policy manuals; training of trainers; capacity and configuration planning for hardware and software; and management of the implementation process. The system was developed to be easy to maintain and expand. This objective was met through of object-oriented development techniques, which allow modification of system components without risk of unintentionally affecting others. Existing functions can be modified and new ones added at a fraction of the cost of traditional systems, and the changes can be added dynamically to meet changing juvenile justice needs.
Below is a picture of the opening screen of the FACTS system.
