General Questions

We ask reviewers to justify in their narrative how information gathered in the interview process supports their ratings. However, this information is confidential, and since some states share the completed OSRI with the caseworker/supervisor as part of the CQI feedback loop, this can affect confidentiality. It is suggested that reviewers include the information in the rating justification but do not directly indicate who provided the information. For example: “This item is rated ANI because at least one person interviewed indicated that the agency did include the parent in case planning meetings but drafted the case plan in advance and only presented it to the parent for signing at the meetings.”

Reviewers should enter the date on which all data entry in the OSRI is complete—including all case item ratings and narratives—and the case is submitted for QA. This is the date on which the period under review (PUR) ends and should be no more than 2 weeks after reviewers started reviewing the case to ensure that the PUR remains as consistent as possible, mitigate the potential for case elimination if a child enters care in an in-home services case toward the end of the review, and support workload management. For cases completed in the Online Monitoring System (OMS), Question E is auto-populated with the date reviewers first submit their case for initial QA.

The OMS options for gender are male, female, and non-binary. Reviewers should choose the option that reflects the gender identified in the agency’s official case record even if the child identifies differently. 

Although OMS logic identifies parents who are potentially applicable to Items 8, 11, 12B, 13, and 15 via the Face Sheet’s Case Participant (G2) Table, it only does so for individuals who are designated in that table as a “Mother,” “Father,” or “Caregiver.” Reviewers must carefully consider all individuals who should potentially be rated as parents in the OSRI and ensure that they are identified with one of those three roles in the table. For legal guardians, select “Caregiver” as their role, identify them as the target child’s legal guardian in the “Relationship to Child” column, and then complete the applicability questions for them in each item as appropriate.

The definition of “open for services” applies only to in-home services cases, to be consistent with the Round 4 in-home services case sampling parameters that exclude investigation/assessment-only cases from the CFSR sample. Consistent with the OSRI instructions, while all agency services and actions on all accepted maltreatment reports and cases from the start of the PUR must be considered by reviewers, the date entered in question J for in-home services cases should be the date the case was opened for case management/service provision. For foster care cases, reviewers should enter the date the maltreatment report was accepted by the agency, consistent with prior rounds. For cases with children placed in a trial home visit setting that meet the criteria to be reviewed as in-home services cases, use the date the maltreatment report was accepted by the agency.

The OSRI refers to the date of latest removal as a child’s removal from his or her normal place of residence and placement in a substitute care setting under the placement and care responsibility of the state or local title IV-B/IV-E agency. Therefore, in this scenario, for the purposes of the OSRI, the date on which the child was located and placed in substitute care should be used to answer Question K.

Reviewers should select NA for Question L if the child has not been in foster care for 60 days and an adjudicatory hearing has not occurred. 

Reviewers should use the date that coincides with 60 calendar days after the child is physically or constructively removed from the home through the voluntary placement agreement to answer Question L (See CWPM §8.3A.11 QA #1).