By Justin Slaughter on August 12, 2010
[From Larry Gordon, L.A. Times, August 2, 2010]
It can be lonely spending the summer in a mainly vacant college dormitory. But it’s a worthwhile tradeoff for Daysi Espinoza, who’s grateful to have a room at Cal State Fullerton to call home.
For Espinoza and hundreds of other former foster youths attending California’s public universities, dorm rooms provide a much-needed stable residence. While classmates can retreat to childhood bedrooms and their families’ embrace, these students are often on their own and want to stay in their dorms during vacations.
“It’s definitely important,” said Espinoza, 19, who lived in foster homes through most of middle school and high school. “Personally, having guaranteed housing has helped me so much.”
State universities are paying much more attention these days to the academic, financial and housing needs of the relatively small group of former foster youths who are enrolled there. About 700 are enrolled at UC campuses and 1,200 in the Cal State system, plus several thousand at community colleges who might transfer to those four-year schools, estimates show.
Posted in News | Tagged california, Education, foster care, foster youth, university, university of california, youth
By admin on December 3, 2009
The Child Welfare System Content Management System (CWS/CMS) has added a new Key Outcomes Presentation Tool to the website.
The Key Outcomes Presentation Tool is an Excel file that displays key measures and reports for California or individual counties. Users can control the interval displayed for the state/counties they have selected.
In some sections users are able to set the span for percent change calculations.
For now, this file will be updated every other quarter. Feedback and suggestions are welcomed.
Please visit:
http://cssr.berkeley.edu/ucb_childwelfare/Ccfsr.aspx
or
http://cssr.berkeley.edu/ucb_childwelfare/
Posted in Foster Care Library | Tagged awesome, california, child welfare data, university of california
By Dana Mandolesi on November 19, 2009
UC fee raises go beyond reason University of California regents are about to consider raising – or, in some cases, initiating – surcharges on certain graduate programs. This plan, while inevitable in the face of shrinking
state support, is regrettable in many ways for Californians: The notion that admission to a topflight public university was a relative bargain here. In-state graduate students now pay a baseline fee of about $10,000, with higher fees on certain professional schools. Those professional fees are about to go up dramatically next fall, if the regents approve these surcharges. However, one of the increases stands out as particularly onerous – and counter to the state’s interest – because of the absence of any linkage
with the economic value of the degree: Initiation of a professional fee (of $4,000) for the social welfare program. This surcharge could deter talented students from going into social work at a time when California has been making strides in reforming its foster care system – and a blue-ribbon commission headed by Supreme Court Justice Carlos Moreno identified reduction of social-worker caseloads as a priority.
Posted in State Foster Care Policy Updates | Tagged berkeley, fee hikes, fees, foster youth, university of california
