The Problem NCFI Addresses
A Fragmented System Creates Fragmented Outcomes
Child welfare does not operate in isolation. Families may interact with multiple systems—including housing, healthcare, behavioral health, education, courts, law enforcement, and community services—yet these systems do not always share information, coordinate effectively, or respond with a common strategy.
The result can be missed opportunities to support families earlier, protect children more effectively, and prevent crises from becoming lifelong trauma.
NCFI believes protecting children and strengthening families are not competing goals—they are inseparable.
That means working toward systems that:
- Support families before crises escalate
- Preserve safe family and kinship connections whenever possible
- Improve stability and permanency for children in care
- Respond urgently when children go missing
- Reduce vulnerability to exploitation and trafficking
- Strengthen transparency, coordination, and accountability
Why NCFI Exists
The National Coalition for Family Integrity brings together families, survivors, advocates, professionals, researchers, policymakers, nonprofit leaders, and community voices to address challenges that no single organization or system can solve alone.
By connecting people, data, policy, and lived experience, NCFI works to advance a more coordinated approach—one that strengthens families, protects children, prevents exploitation, and improves outcomes across systems.
The problems are interconnected. The solutions must be, too.
Be Part of the Solution
Meaningful change requires people and organizations willing to work across traditional boundaries toward a shared goal: safer children, stronger families, and more accountable systems.
The Systems Meant to Protect Children Are Too Often Failing Families
Across the United States, too many children and families experience the devastating effects of unnecessary family separation, placement instability, fragmented systems, and preventable trauma. The National Coalition for Family Integrity (NCFI) exists to help change that.
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WHY THIS MATTERS
Children thrive best within safe, stable, loving families and communities.
Yet every year in the United States:
- Hundreds of thousands of children enter foster care
- Thousands of youth experience repeated placement disruptions
- Many youth age out of care without permanent family connections
- Missing and runaway youth face heightened risks of exploitation and trafficking
- Families in crisis often encounter fragmented systems instead of coordinated support
- NCFI believes protecting children and strengthening families are not competing goals — they are inseparable.
The System Challange
A Fragmented System Creates Fragmented Outcomes
The current child welfare system was built decades ago and is increasingly recognized as outdated, overly complex, and disconnected from what children and families need most.
The Bipartisan Policy Center’s Blueprint for Child Welfare Financing and Accountability Reform concluded that federal child welfare financing is outdated and misaligned with modern research on family stability and child well-being.
Major concerns identified include:
- placement instability
- long stays in foster car
- youth aging out without permanenc
- insufficient prevention services
- weak accountability systems
- fragmented funding structure
- poor coordination across systems
The Connection to Trafficking
Instability Creates Vulnerability
Research and lived experience continue to show strong connections between:
- foster care instability
- runaway episodes
- homelessness
- exploitation and trafficking risk
Children who experience repeated placement changes, attachment disruption, and disconnection from supportive adults face significantly increased vulnerability.
NCFI works to make these systemic connections visible so prevention becomes possible before exploitation occurs.
Key Data:
- 343,077 children were in foster care in FY2023
- Approximately 1 in 5 runaway foster youth are likely trafficking victim
- 59% of youth in care for 2+ years experience 3 or more placements
- Nearly 20,000 youth age out of care annually without permanent family connections
When Children Go Missing
Missing Foster Youth Face Unique Risks
Children who disappear from foster care are often classified as “runaways” rather than missing-endangered or abducted children.
This classification can affect:
- urgency of response
- investigative priority
- coordination between systems
Federal law requires law enforcement and the National Center for Missing & Exploited Children to be notified when foster youth go missing, yet significant accountability gaps remain.
NCFI advocates for:
- Real-time reporting systems
- Stronger interagency coordination
- Transparency and accountability
- Faster recovery responses for missing youth
Families Need Support — Not Just Separation
Many families entering child welfare systems are struggling with:
- housing instability
- mental health challenges
- lack of childcare
- poverty
- substance use disorders
Increasingly, researchers and policymakers recognize that many families need coordinated support services rather than unnecessary separation.
NCFI supports:
- upstream prevention
- family preservation services
- kinship and fictive kin care
- trauma-informed support systems
- coordinated community-based intervention
Why NCFI Exists
NCFI Is Building a Coordinated Systems Response
The National Coalition for Family Integrity brings together:
- families
- survivors
- advocates
- policymakers
- researchers
- visionaries
- legal and medical professionals
- nonprofit leader
- faith and community leaders
To create a coordinated child welfare shift that delivers stronger outcomes than any single entity could achieve alone.
NCFI focuses on:
- family integrity and preservation
- child safety and protection
- trafficking preventio
- transparency and accountability
- policy and financing reform
- cross-system collaboration
- data-driven solutions
Call to Action
Be Part of the Solution
The future of child welfare reform depends on coordinated action.
Join NCFI in building systems that:
- Strengthen families
- Protect children
- Reduce exploitation risk
- Improve accountability
- Create lasting community support networks
Suggested Resource Links
- AFCARS Dashboard
- Bipartisan Policy Center Blueprint for Child Welfare Reform
- Casey Family Programs
- Annie E. Casey Foundation Kids Count
- Child Welfare Information Gateway
- Safe House Project / Team Protectors