Government crest Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities

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Laying the foundations for better local public services

Improving the recruitment of adopters for children who wait the longest

Contents:

  1. Project timeline

There is a national shortage of adopters for children that:

  • are in sibling groups
  • are aged 5 or over
  • are of a minority ethnic heritage 
  • have multiple complex needs

These groups of children typically wait up to a year longer to be adopted, thereby reducing their life chances.

This project, led by Nottinghamshire County Council, will look into the development of data science methods to identify the common characteristics of parents who are willing to adopt. These insights will be used to inform a regional recruitment activity. If successful, this approach could be scaled nationally, and could also be used to recruit foster carers.

Project details

Lead council: Nottinghamshire County Council

Phase: Discovery

Funding granted: £95,000

Partners: Nottingham City Council, Derby City Council and Derbyshire County Council

Project links

Project timeline

March 2023

The project is awarded £95,000 in funding through Round 6 of the Local Digital Fund to begin a discovery phase.

June 2023

The project team has been focussed on completing procurement and setting up the project. This includes reviewing the Data Protection Impact Assessment (DPIA) and testing how data is being brought into the system.

The team will officially begin the project on Tuesday 20 June. They will start engaging with subject matter experts to gain understanding of how data analysis may help to inform recruitment practices and their initial data exploration.