Transitional Age Youth (TAYSF)foster care

San Francisco Examiner reports on need for youth in foster care to have option of extended care

Justin Slaughter — Tue, 17 Jan 2012 23:19:51 +0000

Photo credit: Joseph Schell/Special to The SF Examiner

“Timajae Evans spent his teenage years in foster care, moving from one group home to another. When he aged out of the system at 19, he had to grow up fast.

‘It kind of threw me off for the first month,’ Evans said, recalling the sudden responsibility of having to pay his own bills and shop for his own groceries. Evans, now 20, lives by himself in a Daly City apartment. He is taking general studies courses at City College of San Francisco and hopes to become an auto mechanic.

But while he said he was thriving on his own, he was happy to hear about a new law that will let current foster children stay in the system until they turn 21…”

Source: Amy Crawford, San Francisco Examiner, January 8, 2012

L.A. Times showcases state-wide extension of foster care starting 2012

Justin Slaughter — Thu, 05 Jan 2012 19:07:30 +0000

“They [foster youth "aging out" at 18 years old] will finally benefit from the type of financial and social support that most of their peers receive from their families during young adulthood…

However, to ensure that the funds behind the new law are leveraged to their full potential, more needs to be done to figure out what types of assistance work best for which types of youth…” Read full article here.

Source: Thomas Byrne, Dennis Culhane and Stephen Metraux, Los Angeles Times, January 2, 2011

Y.O.U.T.H. Training Project now accepting current and former foster youth applicants for state-wide youth consultants

Justin Slaughter — Tue, 03 Jan 2012 22:01:06 +0000

The Y.O.U.T.H. Training Project seeks 10 new Y.O.U.T.H. training consultants. Consultants will assist with delivering trainings to social workers throughout California on the needs of transitioning foster youth and positive youth development principles. These trainings focus on how to better serve the needs of Transition-Aged.

The Y.O.U.T.H. Training Project is a youth development program, which works with current and former foster youth ages 16-24. The Project trains youth in facilitation skills and curriculum development, preparing them to develop and deliver trainings to child welfare professionals and the greater community.

These are contracted on-call positions for current and former foster youth between the ages of 16 and 24. The APPLICATION is due January 10, 2012.

Source: Y.O.U.T.H. Training Project, January 3, 2011

After 18 campaign to spread word about extended foster care now available to youth

Justin Slaughter — Tue, 03 Jan 2012 19:00:19 +0000

Starting January 1, 2012, youth are allowed to remain in care after 18, enabling them to maintain a support system. That includes assistance in being better prepared for education and employment training opportunities, as well as developing and maintaining important relationships with caring adults.

Join the After 18 campaign to spread the word about the new choices available to youth, and how a community of support will be by their sides to ensure better futures.

Recognizing that 18 was too young for most youth to be without support, a bill was signed into law in 2010 giving eligible foster youth in California the option to remain in foster care and receive services and supports until age 20. The bill is called the California Fostering Connections to Success Act, and may also be known as Assembly Bill 12 (AB 12)

Source: After 18 California, January 2, 2011

Sen. Al Franken (D-Minn.) ammends No Child Left Behind to accommodate needs of students in foster care

Justin Slaughter — Tue, 25 Oct 2011 17:33:17 +0000

“In what is widely seen a as major step forward in improving education for foster care children in America, an amendment to the No Child Left Behind education bill passed in a 15-7 vote by the Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee last week.

The amendment, which was offered by Sen. Al Franken (D-Minn.), requires school districts to assist foster children in staying in their home school despite being placed in foster families outside that district when it is in their best interest…”

Source: Andrea Poe, Washington Times, October 25, 2011

Opinion piece in San Jose Mercury News links homelessness with need to support youth transitioning out of foster care

Justin Slaughter — Tue, 18 Oct 2011 17:37:03 +0000

“So, what’s the typical outcome for those foster youth transitioning from adolescence to independent adulthood?

The data is horrific — 40 percent of persons living in homeless shelters are former foster children; 14 percent of youth reported being homeless at least once since leaving foster care; and 65 percent exit foster care without a place to live.

In addition to the threat of homelessness, more often they suffer from mental health and substance abuse problems and become involved in the adult prison system — 70 percent of San Quentin inmates grew up in foster care…”

Read full article here.

Source: Andre V. Chapman, San Jose Mercury News, October 18, 2011

ABC KGO-TV San Francisco’s “Beyond the Headlines” feautres John Burton, former foster youth, First Place for Youth, and others to speak on issues in foster care

Justin Slaughter — Thu, 04 Aug 2011 18:07:44 +0000

This episode looks at some of the issues that these foster children face, and talks to community leaders who are dedicated to shaping a healthier future for California’s foster children. ABC7′s Emmy award-winning public affairs show, “Beyond the Headlines,” provides in-depth coverage of the topics and issues facing the people of the Bay Area.

Watch clip here.

Studio Guests:

John Burton
Chair, California Democratic Party
Former State Senator
Founder, John Burton Foundation for Children Without Homes
www.johnburtonfoundation.org

Rebecca Taylor
Former Foster Youth
www.johnburtonfoundation.org

Darrell Evora
President and CEO, EMQ Families First
www.emqff.org
(877) 488-5437

Sam Cobbs
Executive Director, First Place for Youth
www.novaworks.org

Dale Carlsen
Owner, Sleep Train
www.sleeptrain.com

Kim Castaneda
Executive Director, Foster A Dream
www.fosteradream.org

Source: ABC KGO-TV San Francisco, August 4, 2011

Wall Street Journal celebrates positive outcomes for Alameda County’s foster youth following system overhaul

Justin Slaughter — Thu, 09 Jun 2011 17:44:34 +0000

Photo credit: Lianne Milton for Wall Street Journal

“A risky plan to turn around Alameda County’s foster-care system is paying dividends, reducing the number of kids in the program while providing more help to older teens as they make the transition to adulthood…

The shift in Alameda mirrors efforts around the U.S. to address the needs of those in foster care, especially for teens transitioning out of the system at age 18 with little or no support…”

Source: Bobby White, Wall Street Journal, June 9, 2011

Read the Root’s Article About the Precarious Lives for Many Youth After Foster Care

Justin Slaughter — Thu, 12 May 2011 17:00:35 +0000

Photo Credit: Joe Raedle/Getty Images

“On April 29, President Barack Obama issued a proclamation recognizing May as National Foster Care Month.

‘For nearly half a million youth in foster care across our country,” the president began in the lengthy statement, “the best path to success we can give them is the chance to experience a loving home where they can feel secure and thrive.’” [Read Full Article Here].

Source: Cynthia Gordy, the Root. Taken From NPR.com.

Numbers Can Lie

Justin Slaughter — Thu, 07 Oct 2010 20:49:08 +0000

By Justin Slaughter
AmeriCorps VISTA Intern

Last Monday I read the front page headline of the San Francisco Examiner someone had dropped at my desk, and this government statistic stared me in the face: San Francisco places children into foster care at rate of 80 percent above state average. The article’s author was citing the percentage of the entire minor population in San Francisco that enter, or are already in, foster care for a one year period, a statistic that is tracked by the Child Welfare Dynamic Report System run by California Department of Social Services and U.C. at Berkeley.

An official statement is provided from the deputy of San Francisco Human Services Agency (HSA), who points out that, though staggeringly high, these numbers of entry are of historical consequence and have been declining over the last ten years in San Francisco. City Supervisor Sophie Maxwell then loosely criticizes HSA at the very last sentence of the article, ostensibly to highlight the article’s underlying answer as to why San Francisco has so many children in foster care: “they [HSA] always go, ‘We’re trying this and that’…But, then you see the numbers and they’re still shocking.”

Following Maxwell’s subtle finger-pointing, implying that the city has tried and failed to keep kids out of foster care in the first place, the article quickly mentions that during the so-called crack epidemic of the late 80’s, which brought many thousands of local children, a large number of them black, into foster custody, the city policy was to automatically place a child in a foster home if the city could trace any amount of drugs in the child’s system. The comments posted to the online article follow the same assumption that the city of San Francisco has hastened children into care at unusually high rate, calling the headline statistic “shocking” and “embarrassing.”

But before we jump from the author’s unearthed statistics to the conclusion that the foster care system is screwing up, and like all statistical assumptions, we should be cautious.

First, the foster care entry and in-care statistics alone, though accurate, do not reveal anything about the physical and mental well-being of San Francisco foster children. The numbers say nothing as to whether a child, though best tended to by a person of biological or kin relation in ideal circumstances, would otherwise be better off served outside the system.

Secondly, the number of San Francisco foster children who reach permanency, the number one priority of Human Services Agency for the life of each individual foster child, is not even mentioned or compared in the article; though this obviously is a prime indicator of a functioning HSA policy.

Why are so many children taken from the home in the first place? Is it also possible that a high number of children in foster care means that HSA is investigating, substantiating, and preventing abuse and neglect above the state average? This makes just as much sense as the flip-side of the article’s theme.

The idiosyncrasies of the San Franciscan foster care system–its over-representation of black children in the system, the majority of child placements out-of-county, and a high rate of entry above state average–are surprising to many in our community. Are abuse and neglect numerically and racially disproportionate around the Bay? None of us want to entertain this proposition, which is not provable and inevitably judgmental and discriminatory.

And when you hear a mother who lost custody of her child lament on the article’s comment section that “I am out numbered, out matched and can no longer fight this battle alone,” one has to ask: does the arrogance of government streamline children away from families into public custody unjustly? Are we helping or hurting San Francisco families?

Statistics don’t answer the questions that would take years of research to figure out. The article only leaves it up to the reader’s imagination.