Episode #44: Ryan O’Donnell
Welcome to our latest edition of WonkCast: People Power Policy.
Federal and state policy have invested billions of dollars in the information and technology infrastructure on which child welfare systems rely.
You’d think that combination of investment and the extensive data these systems gather about families would allow hyper-specific targeting of interventions and support.
Instead, even the basics often remain out of reach: things like case workers having an accurate phone number, families knowing when they need to be in court, or documents reaching the right recipient.
Today’s guest came to this paradox with the clarity of a beginner’s mind, as a longtime software entrepreneur who first entered child welfare as a foster parent baffled by its tech stack.
Ryan O’Donnell is the CEO and Co-Founder of Sunlight, where he works directly with agencies on technology aimed at improving communication and coordination to better serve families.
We talked about how child welfare ended up with technology over-engineered for compliance, and under-engineered for actual usability, and why better software alone won’t fix financing and procurement.
A field that has often seen overpromising and underdelivering is understandably skeptical by default of the AI era’s hype. This is a clear diagnostic of how we got there and what could shift it.
