Through COA Accreditation, a service of Social Current, we seek to empower organizations to implement best practice standards to improve service delivery and achieve better outcomes for individuals and communities. COA Accreditation provides a framework to help organizations manage resources, incorporate best practices, and strive for continuous improvement.

We believe there is rich expertise in our field, so we ground the COA Accreditation process in our human and social services community. Our volunteer peer reviewers conduct our site visits and finalize accreditation decisions.

We are proud to spotlight the latest Volunteer of the Quarter: Katrina Harrison Peoples.

About Katrina Harrison Peoples

Katrina Harrison Peoples is a native of St. Louis and has more than 20 years of nonprofit experience. She earned her bachelor’s from University of Missouri in human development and family studies as well as her master’s in professional counseling from Lindenwood University. She also has certifications in organizational development and leadership from the Institute of Organizational Development.

Katrina has led program operations in a diverse array of youth service settings, including 24-hour crisis center and helpline services, street-based outreach and drop-in service centers, psychological testing, in-home and office-based counseling, as well as transitional/independent living, school-based, afterschool, level 3-4+ residential, and mentorship programs. After serving in the highest level of operational leadership roles, Katrina shifted her work to funding and providing strategic consulting services to community-based organizations. She currently serves as vice president of school age initiatives at Area Resources for Community and Human Services (ARCHS). In this role, she manages a funding portfolio of contracts totaling over $3 million that serve youth in development and out-of-school programs.

Katrina learned about COA Accreditation during her tenure in the nonprofit sector while working for several COA-accredited organizations. She participated in both initial and several reaccreditation processes prior to serving as a peer reviewer.

In her spare time, Katrina is a fitness professional with several certifications and teaches group exercise classes.

Q&A

What led you to become a COA Accreditation Volunteer?

My desire to become a COA Accreditation volunteer was sparked after participating in my organization’s COA committee as we were preparing for our initial accreditation process. Participating in that committee and working through the process led to my interest in expanding beyond programs and additionally understanding the organization as a system. After going through the process, I began to think more systematically about my work, which has positively impacted my leadership lens.

What are your strongest beliefs about the value of COA Accreditation?

Having gone through initial accreditation and reaccreditation as an employee in various organizations, I believe the biggest value is the process of preparing for accreditation. I have seen countless examples of how an organization can grow and mature by understanding the value and developing new systems of doing the work. I have seen culture change as the organization starts to identify new priorities and let go of old mindsets. I have also seen how the intensity of preparation has fostered a sense of teamwork across various departments, improved order and structure, and has created more respect and appreciation across the organization for the various aspects of work that contribute to accomplishing the mission.

What excites, surprises, and/or challenges you the most about the work you do as a COA Accreditation volunteer?

What excites me the most is that no site visit experience is ever the same but ALL of them provide a rich learning experience. Each organization has its own unique mission, culture, and methods that best serve their communities. It’s a privilege to get an up-close-and-personal view of how the organization operates. I always learn something of value that I can bring back home.

Share a memorable place, person, or experience from a site visit.

I completed a site visit during the pandemic and could never have imagined there would be a time where a site visit could be completed virtually. While it was not the same and we lost some things in the absence of in-person interactions, the review team was fully committed to working together to honor the process so that the organization did not miss any of the value in going through the process. I was also impressed with how quickly Social Current transitioned training and all the systems to a virtual context.

Learn more about how to become a peer review volunteer and apply online.

Human services nonprofits face several challenges in measuring their organizations’ health and stability. It is a frequent hot topic among thought leaders and organizations working to achieve COA Accreditation, a service of Social Current. Within COA Accreditation, our Analyzing and Reporting Information standards are among the most difficult to achieve.

To support organizations, we have updated Social Current’s COA Accreditation Benchmarking Program with an interactive data dashboard. This program for COA-accredited private and Canadian organizations contextualizes the performance against peer entities on 15 measures of health and stability in four performance domains:

• Financial Health
• Governance
• Workforce Development
• Risk Management

Our program is focused solely on human and social service organizations and, unlike other benchmarking services, maintains comparison integrity—the extent to which the comparison group matches your organization. What value does a benchmark provide a child welfare organization if it was derived from animal rights nonprofits? Through our multitiered algorithm to match similar organizations, you will receive apples-to-apples comparisons.

In creating this program, we partnered with leaders in human and social services, COA-accredited organizations, and our volunteer peer reviewers to define universal measures of organizational health and stability.

By collecting, aggregating, and sharing this data, this program creates value at multiple levels:

• COA-Accredited Organizations: To monitor basic key performance indicators and better understand their performance
• Social Current: To better understand its network
• Our Network as a Whole: To enrich the sector and better impact its communities

To learn more, visit our benchmarking webpage or contact our Data Help Team at Social Current.

This benchmarking program announcement follows the launch of our 2023 standards updates. The Social Current team will continue to create research-based and field-informed solutions around accreditation for the human and social services field. See the standards updates.

The 2023 edition of updates to the standards for COA Accreditation, a service of Social Current, is now available. These targeted enhancements to the standards are the result of our annual process and include changes based on ongoing collection and analysis of feedback received from our network, collaboration with diverse groups of subject matter experts, and a review of research and professional literature on identified trends and evolving practices.

Our collaborative update process is designed to ensure the standards remain up-to-date, research-based, and field-informed, promoting improved outcomes for individuals, families, and communities.

Who’s Affected

These changes impact private, public, and Canadian accredited organizations. The 2023 edition of updates will not impact organizations that are currently pursuing accreditation or re-accreditation and have already been assigned standards in the MyCOA portal.

When It is Happening

Standards assignments for COA Accreditation using the new standards began April 20, 2023.

What’s Changing in Our Standards

Revised Standards for Residential Treatment Services

We have revised our standards for Residential Treatment Services (RTX) to better address important topics in the field, including encouraging appropriate use of residential treatment, centering resident voice and choice, maximizing family involvement, creating a trauma-informed service culture, reducing the use of restrictive interventions, and working with residents to develop the skills they need to manage challenges and live successfully at home and in the community. The 2023 updates to RTX include:

• New and revised content on promoting healing and empowerment through relationships, choice, and active engagement​
• New and revised content on promoting a noncoercive environment where individuals have the support they need and crises are prevented​
• New and revised content on developing, practicing, and generalizing new skills and strategies​
• New content on working with Peer and Family Partners
• Shifting towards person-centered language and away from terms like “resident”

Revised Standards for Equity, Diversity, and Inclusion

We have released equity, diversity, and inclusion (EDI) enhancements to our standards to advance administrative and service delivery practices that embed EDI and promote the delivery of equitable services for all people through physically and psychologically safe, inclusive, and trauma-informed environments. The 2023 EDI updates include new or enhanced content on:

• Developing an organization-wide equity statement
• Reviewing human resource policies and procedures through an equity lens
• Providing opportunities for personnel to practice cultural humility
• Disaggregating data to identify disproportionate outcomes
• Creating safe, welcoming, and inclusive administrative and service delivery environments
• Resource and adoptive family recruitment that prioritizes the needs of children and youth in care
• Training and support for staff and resource families focused on meeting the diverse needs of children and youth in care​
• Prohibiting coercive, threatening, or otherwise harmful treatment modalities​

Additional Revisions

In response to feedback from our network, we are also releasing a collection of revisions throughout the COA Accreditation standards to provide clarity and/or remain current with trends in the field. Highlights include:

• An NA in PRG 5 and 6 for programs not focused on serving individuals with intellectual and developmental disabilities and a new standard in ASE to promote inclusive services in all programs
• New glossary definitions for “Secondary Traumatic Stress” and “Child-Focused Recruitment” and a revised definition for “Trauma-Informed”
• A series of updates to clarify the intent and applicability of NAs throughout the standards
• Updates to PRG 3: Medication Management for programs that allow residents to store and/or administer their own medication
• Updates to FKC 12: Supports and Services for Expectant and Parenting Youth

A full list of standards impacted by the 2023 updates can be found here.

Our Process

The 2023 COA Accreditation standards updates reflect changes made based on evolving practices, ongoing review of relevant literature, and the continuous feedback we receive from our network, including volunteer reviewers and accredited organizations. More specifically, updating the 2023 Standards involved:

• Collection, in-depth review, and synthesis of prominent published research and professional literature in targeted areas
• Review of standards drafts and discussion of trends in the field with Standards Advisory Panels comprised of subject matter experts, agency leaders, and service providers
• Collection and review of feedback solicited from Social Current’s network, including through the “Provide Feedback” button found in the MyCOA and VIP portals
• Sharing drafts online for a period of field comment to solicit feedback from Social Current’s network and the broader social service sector

Questions?

If you are currently pursuing accreditation or re-accreditation, reach out to your accreditation coordinator.

If you are seeking accreditation for the first time, please contact Joe Perrow.

For additional information about COA Accreditation standards, please contact Melissa Dury.

COA Accreditation, a service of Social Current, is proposing enhancements to its standards that will be released in early 2023.

The Residential Treatment (RTX) standards have been revised to better address important topics in the field, including resident voice and choice, family involvement, trauma-informed care, strategies for reducing the use of restrictive interventions, and how to help residents develop the skills to manage challenges and live successfully at home and in the community.

These recommended updates are now open for review and comment from the field. Download and review the proposed standards. The deadline to make comments is Jan. 11, 2023.

COA Accreditation has also proposed equity, diversity, and inclusion enhancements to its standards to better promote the delivery of equitable services for all people through physically and psychologically safe, welcoming, and trauma-informed environments. Submit feedback on these revisions by Jan. 3, 2023.

These proposed updates reflect an in-depth review and synthesis of prominent published research and professional literature as well as collaboration with a diverse group of subject matter experts from this field. The field comment period is a critical step in our process because it ensures our standards are field informed by including input from provider organizations in the development process.

This critical pairing of research and practice ensures that the COA Accreditation standards remain rigorous, practical, and reflective of current trends and evolving practices and continue to promote improved outcomes for individuals, families, and communities.

COA Accreditation, a service of Social Current, is proposing enhancements to its standards to better promote the delivery of equitable services for all people through physically and psychologically safe, welcoming, and trauma-informed environments. These recommended updates that support equity and inclusivity, are now open for review and comment from the field.

Review the proposed standards online and make comments by Jan. 3, 2023. Detailed instructions for submitting comments are included in the standards document.

These proposed revisions reflect an in-depth review and synthesis of prominent published research and professional literature as well as collaboration with a diverse group of subject matter experts from this field. The field comment period is a critical step in our process because it ensures our standards are field informed by including input from provider organizations in the development process.

This critical pairing of research and practice ensures that COA Accreditation standards remain rigorous, practical, and reflective of current trends and evolving practices and continue to promote improved outcomes for individuals, families, and communities.

These standards will be released in early 2023.

The 2022 edition of updates to the standards for COA Accreditation, a service of Social Current, have recently been released. These targeted enhancements to the standards are the result of our annual process and include changes based on ongoing collection and analysis of feedback received from our network, collaboration with diverse groups of subject matter experts, and a review of research and professional literature on identified trends and evolving practices.

Our collaborative update process is designed to ensure the standards remain up-to-date and field-informed, promoting improved outcomes for individuals, families, and communities.

Who’s Affected

These changes impact private, public, and Canadian accredited organizations. The 2022 edition of updates will not impact organizations that are currently pursuing accreditation or re-accreditation and have already been assigned standards in the MyCOA portal.

When It’s Happening

Standards will officially be released on the Social Current website on March 30.

Standards assignments for COA Accreditation begin April 4.

What’s Changing in Our Standards

New Standards for Office-Based Opioid Treatment (DTX)
We have revised our standards for Day Treatment Services (DTX) to accommodate providers offering medication-assisted treatment under the Drug Addiction Treatment Act of 2000. The American Society of Addiction Medicine identifies ongoing maintenance medication with appropriate psychosocial treatment as the gold standard of care for opioid use disorder. Within the context of the opioid epidemic, this work supports improved access to quality programs offering this evidence-based treatment. The 2022 updates to DTX include:

• Two new personnel standards for programs providing office-based opioid treatment
• New personnel standards for peer support providers working in DTX programs
• Expanded training requirements for clinical personnel providing treatment for alcohol and drug use disorders
• A new Core Concept Standard, DTX 9: Office-Based Opioid Treatment
• Interpretations and Examples throughout DTX to support standard implementation within the context of office-based opioid treatment programs

Additional Revisions
In response to feedback from our network, we are also releasing many minor revisions throughout the COA Accreditation standards to provide clarity and/or remain current with trends in the field. Some of the highlights include:

• Clarifying the applicability of various standards through updated NAs (Not Applicable) and Notes
• Updating the glossary with new and updated definitions, including a new definition for therapeutic interventions
• Updated standards on several key practices including maintaining Naloxone on site (ASE 6.03) and the annual Board review of overall risk (GOV 5.05)

A full list of standards impacted by the 2022 updates can be found online.

Our Process

The 2022 COA Accreditation standards updates reflect changes made based on evolving practices, ongoing review of relevant literature, and the continuous feedback we receive from our network, including volunteer reviewers and accredited organizations. More specifically, updating the 2022 Standards involved:

• Collection, in-depth review, and synthesis of prominent published research and professional literature in targeted areas
• Review of standards drafts and discussion of trends in the field with Standards Advisory Panels comprised of subject matter experts, agency leaders, and service providers
• Collection and review of feedback solicited from Social Current’s network, including through the “Provide Feedback” button found in the MyCOA and VIP portals
• Sharing drafts online for a period of field comment to solicit feedback from Social Current’s network and the broader social service sector

Questions?

If you are an in-process or accredited organization, reach out to your accreditation coordinator.

If you are seeking accreditation for the first time, contact Joe Perrow.

For additional information about COA Accreditation standards, contact Melissa Dury.

The Council on Accreditation (COA) is proud to announce the publication of our 2021 Private Standards!

The new standards will affect private organizations seeking accreditation.

In response to feedback from accredited organizations, COA revised the standards update process in 2020 from ongoing/monthly updates to annual updates. The 2021 updates reflect that annual process and include changes that were made based on ongoing collection and analysis of feedback received from our organizations and volunteer reviewers, collaboration with diverse groups of subject matter experts, and a review of research and professional literature on identified trends and evolving practices.

The 2021 updates include:

• New Standards for Office-Based Opioid Treatment (MHSU)
• Updated Standards for Child and Youth Behavioral Health Programs (MHSU)
• Updated Standards for Child and Family Development and Support (CFD)
• Updated Standards for Family Preservation and Stabilization (FPS)
• Updated Standards for Treatment Foster Care (FKC)
• Updated Standards for Equity, Diversity, and Inclusion
• Additional updates and revisions in response to the COVID-19 pandemic

You can download the detailed changes for each of the updated sections in our 2021 Update document available here or in your MyCOA portal.

Note: The 2021 Edition will not impact organizations that are currently pursuing accreditation or re-accreditation and have already been assigned standards in the MyCOA portal.  If you are an in-process organization and have questions about the updates, please contact your Accreditation Coordinator.

In response to the COVID-19 pandemic, COA made adaptations to the Site Visit, a foundational part of the accreditation review. Incorporating feedback from our volunteers and organizations, the new virtual review options both allow organizations to move forward with completing their accreditation requirements and prioritize the safety and health of our Volunteers, organizations, and the individuals they serve, all while maintaining the integrity and rigor of our accreditation process. The virtual review is fundamentally designed to minimize in-person interaction amid the pandemic. Conducting interviews and reviewing onsite documents/evidence is completed remotely, through the use of HIPAA-compliant secure environment. When an in-person walkthrough of the organization is needed, assignment of local volunteers is prioritized to minimize travel (and any related concern(s)), and safety guidelines are stressed and followed.

As the pandemic continues to challenge all facets of our lives, we are tested to think differently, creatively, and with flexibility to accommodate for these unpredictable times. The move to virtual reviews required a quick turnaround from planning to implementation, and the continual feedback we have received has helped to refine the process. As a result, COA has increased different ways of communicating expectations and providing support, such as developing a checklist to clarify steps of the virtual review, establishing monthly meetings with leads of the review team, and hosting webinars on virtual reviews for organizations and Volunteers.

The collaboration between Volunteers and organizations has been instrumental in the successful implementation of the virtual review. We are pleased to relay reflections from a Volunteer for COA as she experienced her first virtual review!

COA – The virtual way

-Maddi Noleen, COA Peer Review Volunteer

Have questions about the virtual review process? Reach out to your Accreditation Coordinator, or contact us here.

In 2016, COA began our 2020 strategic planning process. We talked with and surveyed our network on their reasons for seeking COA accreditation and how we could provide even more value to their experience. One recurring theme was the need for data. Our organizations employ sophisticated quality improvement systems to manage their success, but respondents noted a lack of quality external benchmark data to complement their internal data.

History

COA’s pilot benchmarking program launched in the summer of 2016 as part of COA’s Maintenance of Accreditation (MOA) process. It was based on two years of research and replaced our old, narrative-driven MOA process. In the old process, organizations would write an extensive overview of their PQI activities in the past 12 months, and COA would review these narratives and provide feedback. It was a time- and resource-intensive process, and at the end of the day provided little value to COA or our accredited organizations.

We wanted to create a system which had 360-degree value for our network, and this idea was the genesis of the pilot benchmarking program. By collecting, aggregating, and sharing data, we created a system which provided value to all parties:

1. COA can better understand our network;
2. Organizations are monitoring basic key performance indicators to understand their performance; and
3. Our network, as a whole, is enriched with comparative benchmark data.

We started with five measures of organizational health and sustainability: days cash on hand, staff retention rate, management retention rate, average staff tenure, and rate of substantiated grievances. Organizations resoundingly preferred this system and, based on feedback from our network, it surfaced again and again as a priority for us during our strategic planning process for 2020. Based on feedback from our network, we’re enhancing this system to collect and share back even more benchmark performance data.

Goals

We had three primary goals for refining our benchmarking program:

1. Universal measures: COA accredits over 60 services and works with a plethora of organizations within the human and social services space. When selecting new measures for this program, we stuck with measures of organization health and sustainability because these are applicable to human and social service organizations of any size or purpose.
2. Unlike any other benchmarking services available to our network: we knew we needed a unique benchmarking program which provided:
   • Multifaceted measures which gave a holistic view of an organization’s performance          
   • Segmentation logic. Much of the benchmark data available to our sector is not specific to human and social service organizations. Many times, data is collected from all tax-exempt entities. But, it’s just not valuable for our network to be compared to animal welfare organizations, arts nonprofits, and similar entities. Our program is focused solely on human and social service organizations. In addition, we’re using all of our data to create very narrow segments or clusters of organization for even more valuable comparisons. In future iterations, we hope to roll out custom segmentation for our end-users.
3. Improved data collection methodology: as a part of the new MOA process, we’re collecting benchmark data from our network annually and associating it with a discrete fiscal year. This ensures we have a consistent and reliable flow of data to share back with our network.

New Benchmarking Program

Starting in 2020, all organizations accredited under COA’s Private and Canadian organization accreditation will provide data via an Annual Report. This report is due 60 days after the start of your fiscal year and collects data on your prior fiscal year. It is part of our Maintenance of Accreditation process, and organizations must complete this report to maintain their accredited status. Here’s how the process will work:

1. COA will notify your organization’s primary contact 60 days before the Annual Report is due. This should land around the first day of your new fiscal year.
   • Once this notification is received, organizations can access their Annual Report cycle via their MyCOA Portal.
   • The MyCOA Portal has step-by-step instructions for gathering and inputting the requested data.

Step-by-step guide to completing the Annual Report

Around the start of your fiscal year, your organization’s primary contact will receive an email inviting you to complete your Annual Report. It will list the due date and steps for completing the report.

Next, log in to your MyCOA Portal. Use the Pick a Cycle link to navigate to the correct cycle. In this example, the organization’s Annual Report is currently due. In addition, the organization has 2 Maintenance Fee cycles in 2020 and 2021; for these cycles, only the Maintenance Fee is due. To complete the Annual Report, select “2020 Annual Report.”

On this page, the timeline will show when the Annual Report is due – in this case, on 12/31/2020. Select “Continue.”

This page gives a step-by-step overview of how to complete the Annual Report.

Step 1

If you’d like, you can review the Annual Report requirements and FAQs using the links in Step 1.

Step 2

COA understands that, oftentimes, only one or two staff have access to the MyCOA Portal. So, we created the Annual Report Prep Tool to help you gather your data before inputting it into the MyCOA Portal. Click the DOWNLOAD button in step 2; COA will merge any data we may already have into this document so you’re not doing duplicative work. Share the Prep Tool with relevant staff to gather your data. Please note the completion of the Prep Tool is optional. The Prep Tool is for internal records only and does not need to be submitted to COA.

Step 3

In order to complete the Annual Report, all data must be submitted electronically in your MyCOA portal. Hover over the MAINTENANCE tab in the top toolbar, and select “Annual Report from the dropdown menu.

This will open the Annual Report electronic submission form.

If you used the Prep Tool, copy the information from the Prep Tool into this form. You’ll notice that the questions are in the exact same order as in the Prep Tool. You can save at any time by click the “Save my progress and resume later” checkbox in the top right corner and then the Save button.

Once all information is entered, click the Submit button at the bottom of the form.

On the following page, confirm the accuracy of your data. Then, click Confirm to fully submit your data. At this point, you can also select “Print this page” to print a copy of your report for your records.

Once the data is submitted, the card on your Milestone Timeline will indicate the completion date and you are done with your submission! Please note: If you would like to make any changes to your submission, please submit a Support Ticket in the MyCOA portal.

The Benchmark Report – available Q1 2021

Once COA receives all data from accredited organizations for a particular fiscal year, we’ll unlock the benchmark report and allow you to access it from within your MyCOA Portal. Download a sample benchmark report here.

Segmentation Logic

The benchmark report uses segmentation logic to create a comparison group of organizations like yours; we then use this group to calculate your benchmark figures. We use data on your business type (nonprofit or for–profit), services provided, revenue, and geographic location to construct this group and ensure an apples-to-apples comparison. We want to provide you with data which has the utmost “comparison integrity” so you can be confident the benchmarks are meaningful to you.

The cover page indicates the fiscal year to which the report pertains, describes the group of organizations against which your organization is compared, and lists the publication date – the date on which the report was generated.

The characteristics of your organization are used to generate the comparison group. The sample organization receiving this report is a nonprofit organization accredited under COA’s Private Organization Accreditation program and provides foster care services with a revenue between $5-10M. When generating your benchmark data, then, we pulled data only from organizations which fit these characteristics. This ensures the comparisons made in this document are valuable to the sample organization.

The following pages organize all benchmark metrics into their domains. First, we have the FINANCIAL HEALTH BENCHMARKS: each metric is given a title, a description of what it is and why it is important, and a chart comparing the sample organization’s data to the average value of its comparison group. In this top metric, Months of Liquid Unrestricted Net Assets or LUNA, the sample organization and its comparison group had 6 months of LUNA, so the sample organization can be confident that its liquidity – as measured by LUNA – is within normal range for their type of organization.

Each subsequent page lists measures belonging to a particular performance domain, and follows the same structure: title, description, and a chart comparing your data against your comparison group.

Scrolling down, the ADDITIONAL DATA page shows all of the sample organization’s data and the comparison figures in one view. We also provide the Percent Rank for each metric. The Percent Rank locates your organization within the comparison dataset. For example, the sample organization’s Months of Liquid Unrestricted Net Assets has a percent rank of 33.3%. This means that the organization’s Months of LUNA was higher than a third of organizations but lower than two-thirds of organizations in the comparison dataset. Percent rank is just another way of showing you how you compare to similar organizations.

The final page lists some FAQs. As your questions come in, we’ll update this page with more information for reading and understanding your benchmark report.

Additional information

We have created a custom website with further information about COA’s benchmarking program at www.coameasures.org.

If you missed our benchmarking webinars, please feel free to view the recording here.

If you have any further questions about changes to the maintenance of accreditation process, please feel free to contact Ingrid Zamudio, Data Science Manager. For questions specific to your organization, please submit a support ticket in your MyCOA portal.