Former social worker Thea Ramirez has developed an artificial intelligence -powered tool that she says helps social service agencies find the best adoptive parents for some of the nation’s most vulnerable kids.
But an Associated Press investigation has found that the Family-Match algorithm has produced limited results in the states where it has been used, raising questions about the ability of artificial intelligence to solve such enduring human problems.
Two states dropped the tool with only a few adoptions at the end of their initial pilots. Social workers in Florida, Georgia and Virginia told AP that Family-Match wasn’t useful and often led them to unwilling families. Florida agencies, on the other hand, reported a more positive experience with the algorithm, saying that it assisted them in tapping into a broader pool of prospective parents.
Ramirez declined interview requests but said in an email that “Family-Match is a valuable tool and helpful to users actively using it to support their recruitment + matching efforts.”
Here are some takeaways from the investigation:
ROOTED IN FAITH
Ramirez, of Brunswick, Ga. where her nonprofit is also based, got her start building a website meant to bring prospective adoptive parents together with mothers giving up their babies for adoption.
Ramirez marketed her website to anti-abortion counseling centers, which seek to persuade women to bring their pregnancies to term.
“Could we make Roe v. Wade obsolete by raising adoption awareness? I think so,” Ramirez wrote in a 2012 blog post about her website. Ramirez said in an email that Family-Match is not associated with the program for mothers with unwanted pregnancies.
INSPIRED BY ONLINE DATING
Ramirez recruited research scientist Gian Gonzaga, asking if he would team up with her to create an adoption matchmaking tool based on compatibility, to…
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