Alia Impact Report

Dear friends of Alia,

As Alia approaches its 10th anniversary in late 2025, we’re reflecting on our journey—from our founding vision to the impact we’re making today—and looking ahead to a future where all children thrive within their families and communities. When we launched in 2015, we listened closely to leaders in child welfare. While many recognized the need for system change and valued family reunification, much of the focus remained on supporting foster youth aging out of care, rather than preventing separation in the first place. Alia was founded with a bold mission: to end the need to separate children from their families.

Since then, we’ve been building a Proof of Concept that shows children can safely remain with their families when parents receive timely, culturally relevant support. Over the past decade, we’ve collaborated with hundreds of communities across the U.S. and Canada and worked alongside tens of thousands of child welfare professionals, policymakers, and families to design transformative solutions. Together, we’re reshaping mindsets, policies, and practices with one core belief at heart: families belong together. Guided by our foundational value—“Doing what love would do”—we remain committed to creating a world where separation is no longer the default response to family struggle.

USTK Squares-2-1

Learn more about our history

Where we work

Since our founding, the Alia way of thinking, and our collected evidence and case for change began shifting mindsets across the ecosystem. These days, we no longer get called to help “convince” people to change, now the calls sound like, “We get it, but HOW do we make the change?” This is where Alia’s experience as a “Do Tank” comes— in we believe there are some things you cannot know until you try them. We’re not just talking about it, we’re doing it— real change with real people on the ground in more than 30 communities every year, reaching tens of thousands of changemakers in all 50 U.S. states and Canada.

Alabama

✅ Keynotes
✅ Trainings

California

✅ Trainings

Canada

✅ Keynotes
✅ Trainings

Colorado

✅ Keynotes
✅ Trainings

DC

✅ Keynotes
✅ Trainings

Florida

✅ Keynotes
✅ Trainings

Georgia

✅ Trainings

Illinois

✅ Keynotes

Indiana

✅ Keynotes
✅ Trainings

Iowa

✅ Keynotes
✅ Trainings

Kansas

✅ Keynotes

Maine

✅ Keynotes

Maryland

✅ Keynotes

Michigan

✅ Keynotes
✅ Trainings

Minnesota

✅ Keynotes
✅ Trainings

Missouri

✅ Keynotes

New Hampshire

✅ Keynotes

New Jersey

New Mexico

✅ Keynotes

New York

✅ Keynotes

North Carolina

✅ Keynotes

North Dakota

✅ Trainings

Ohio

✅ Keynotes

Oklahoma

Oregon

✅ Keynotes

Tennessee

✅ Keynotes

Texas

✅ Keynotes

Vermont

✅ Trainings

Virginia

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Washington

✅ Keynotes

Wisconsin

✅ Keynotes
✅ Trainings

Wyoming

✅ Keynotes

Hundreds of keynotes & trainings

Dozens of summits with hundreds of participants

29 parent-vetted approaches to prevention

2900 unique downloads of parent-approved approaches

17 parents equitably engaged in selecting Bright Spot resources

17 child welfare leaders and staff engaged in Alia's inaugural Accelerator Lab

Up to 84% of participating youth achieve permanency

Hundreds of youth have achieved permanency

Implemented IPS in over 50 jurisdictions in the U.S. and Canada

Formed an industry leading partnership with Keyhubs

Provided workforce wellbeing in 3 statewide systems and 10 counties

Provided workforce wellbeing to 2 large health systems

Supported over 3100 human services workers and leaders

Facilitated thousands of coaching hours with system leaders

Hosted hundreds of Breakthrough Sessions

Transform

Beginning in 2016, Alia paved the way for human-centered design in the child welfare ecosystem because we knew that we could only transform the system by authentically partnering together leaders and impacted parents. This work was built on a partnership with industry-leading design group IDEO, and later IDEO.org, starting with the Ten of Ten for Kids National Redesign and continuing with the UnSystem Innovation Cohort. Alia continues to innovate and co-design ways to keep families safely together alongside amazing people impacted by the system and those who have or currently work in the system.

Child safety conferences keep 96% of 426 youth involved safely home (Eastern Iowa Service Area)

70% decrease in the number of youth in residential care (Waupaca County, WI)

58% decrease in child removals (Eau Claire County, WI)

44% decrease in the number of youth in residential care (Cass County, ND)

44% decrease in the number of disrupted sibling groups (Washington County, MD)

10 active or completed co-design projects

Engaged with hundreds of co-designers (youth, parents, system partners)

Created groundbreaking resources accessed more than 3600 times

In our most comprehensive engagement to date, Rock Families First, we are currently working in our sixth year with the child welfare system in Rock County, Wisconsin and 13 mothers known as the BeeHive, who have been impacted by the child welfare system. System leaders and BeeHive members are working together to build a new way of work that keeps children in Rock County safely with their families.

Since Rock Families First began, parents and county child welfare leaders and staff have worked side by side to put their co-designed Idea Book into action.

Their solutions include engaging lived experts as part of early intervention efforts, expanding the use of concrete supports and peer mentors, reexamining the consequences of mandated reporting, involving parents in co-designing social worker performance appraisals, and making broader mindset and practice shifts to build a Rock-solid community.

Alia cultivated trust and collective action in the community, guided county leaders to become more trusted partners with members of the community, and inspired mindset and practice shifts. Magic happens in the middle where we bring impact parents and systems leaders to co-design and build a better way, together.

Community impact

Through Rock Families First and together with our partners, Alia is achieving reductions in the use of out of home care that far exceed statewide and national rates.

58% reduction in youth in out-of-home care

53% reduction in youth in residential care

79% reduction in reentries of youth into care within one year

165% increase in community requests for support for families instead of separation

National data collected and analyzed by the US Government through the Adoption and Foster Care Analysis and Reporting System (AFCARS) has found that between 2018 and 2023 the number of children in care declined about 22% Nationally and about 32% in Wisconsin. Rock County, WI saw a decline of 58% over this same time period.

In addition to more kids living within their families and communities in Rock County, we have seen outcomes that indicate children are as safe or safer living with those they know and love.

Organizational impact

Rock County has also seen outcomes that reflect the mindset and culture shifts within the organization, which allow them to stay at this work of keeping more families safely together.

98% retention in frontline staff in 2024

89% of staff feel their priorities and perspectives are in alignment with the Mission, Vision, and Guiding Principles

79% of staff say their direct supervisor listens to and values what they have to say

71% of staff feel comfortable sharing their opinions and insights with coworkers even if they differ

Early on, Rock County engaged in Alia’s workforce resilience & wellbeing work. This allowed staff to evaluate whether or not their values aligned with this national values shift. As a result, the entire workforce at Rock County today is fully invested in advancing the vision of keeping families safely together.

The Director of Rock County Human Services, Kate Luster, stressed how the strengthening of their leadership team was a crucial prerequisite to engaging in systems change and co-design work for the entire organization. Bringing in a program manager as a direct connection between those on the frontlines and leadership, the alignment as a leadership team in terms of mindset and direction, and ongoing leadership coaching has led to many impacts: prioritizing prevention and early intervention within practice, investing upstream, shifting resources to the community, and increased leadership tenure. The Director also shared her perspective on leadership coaching; “The leadership support for me, having Amelia and Alia as a resource when things get tough, I don’t know what direction to go, I need reminders that this is the nature of the work and I’ll come out on the other side, the support and encouragement, sounding-bound type resource, has made a big difference – I couldn’t have done this alone.”

Another impact of this work was the philosophical shift in the role of Resource Parents. The refreshed training provided to new and existing Resource Parents sets new guidance: our goal is ongoing connection with siblings, with extended family, with parents, and with their system of support including people to whom they are related and are trusted adults.

Alia Impact Report

Dear friends of Alia,

Where we work

Influence

Equip

Transform

Project Spotlight: Rock Families First

Community impact

Organizational impact

With deep gratitude for our partners