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Benjamin Porter
Last Update: March, 2002

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What Does Research Say About Interagency Collaboration? Interagency collaborations represent one of the most challenging and important efforts to restructure services to be more responsive to children and families. They involve new relationships between and among service providers and the children and families they serve. In short, they require change. Interagency collaboration is a means to an end. Generally, the "means" is defined as providing more flexible, comprehensive, and effective services to children and their families than could be provided without such collaboration. The end result is better outcomes for children and families. Some essential elements of comprehensive service delivery made possible through interagency collaborations include:

Easy access to a wide array of prevention, treatment, and support services, no matter who provides those services
Techniques to ensure that appropriate services are received and are adjusted to meet the changing needs of children and families
A focus on the whole family
Efforts to empower families within an atmosphere of mutual respect
Continuity in the delivery of services and support, with trust-building relationships between workers and family members
An emphasis upon improved outcomes for children and families, based upon realistic but high expectations for achievement (List adapted from Melaville with Blank, 1991)

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