New SWAN Unit of Service: Family Matching

The prime contractor is pleased to announce the release of the first new SWAN unit of service in 20 years: Family Matching. This service is available to the affiliates for referral as of July 1, 2022.

Family Matching focuses on engaging potential resource families who are waiting to be matched and developing their capacity to provide successful permanency. The Family Matching unit includes ongoing efforts in these areas as well as activities to identify a child for placement with an eligible SWAN family through the implementation of a Family Matching Plan. Family Matching is an eight-month unit of service with a four-month extension.

The Family Matching unit originated as a recommendation from the SWAN Rates Workgroup. Once approved, the unit was developed in collaboration with the network through a series of Unit of Service meetings. SWAN affiliate and county agencies participated in these meetings to inform SWAN Family Matching benchmarks and create templates and template guidelines for the unit of service. The templates include the Family Matching Plan, Family Matching Log, Family Matching Extension Assessment for Unmatched Families and Family/Child Match Confirmation form. The Family Matching templates and benchmarks can be found in the SWAN Permanency Toolkit.

The prime contract is offering trainings for the Family Matching unit throughout July and August. The training is available to county and affiliate agencies and will outline the required benchmarks and templates for the unit.

We are immensely proud of the network’s collaborative efforts to make this service a reality for children and families in Pennsylvania. If you have any questions about the SWAN Family Matching unit of service or related trainings, please contact your SWAN regional technical assistant or program technical assistant.