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Children's Bureau/
ACF/DHHS
Independent Living/Transition to Adulthood

Resources for Supporting Young People
  • State Policies to Help Youth Transition Out of Foster Care
    This issue brief from the National Governor's Association Center for Best Practices describes ways that states can strengthen policies, improve coordination across agencies and systems, better utilize resources, and meaningfully engage foster youth to improve the outcomes of youth leaving the foster care system and at-risk youth in general.

  • Youth Aging Out of Foster Care: Identifying Strategies and Best Practices
    This issue brief from the National Association of Counties outlines the current federal framework addressing youth aging out of foster care, identifies general outcomes for these young people, and highlights model county programs and best practices that are addressing the needs of this population in innovative ways.

  • Supporting Foster Youth to Achieve Employment and Economic Self-Sufficiency
    This paper highlights the unique characteristics of the young people who age out of the foster care system each year. The framework for examining this population is being done within the context of Guideposts for Success, developed by the National Collaborative on Workforce and Disability for Youth (NCWD/Youth) in conjunction with the U.S. Department of Labor's Office of Disability Employment Policy (ODEP). These Guideposts identify a range of opportunities, supports, and services that all foster youth, including those with disabilities, need in order to transition from adolescence to productive adulthood and citizenship.

  • Negotiating the Curves Toward Employment: A Guide about Youth Involved in the Foster Care System
    This guide from the National Collaborative on Workforce and Disability builds upon the NCWD/Youth organizing framework, Guideposts for Success, which details what research says all youth, including youth with disabilities, need to successfully transition to adulthood. This publication applies the Guideposts to meeting the needs of youth in foster care with and without disabilities. The Guide also provides facts and statistics about youth involved in the foster care system; gives examples of states and communities that are changing policy and practices; identifies areas requiring further attention by policy makers and providers of services; and identifies resources and tools to assist cross-system collaborative efforts.

  • Health Care for Adolescents and Young Adults Leaving Foster Care: Policy Options for Improving Access
    This issue brief from the Center for Adolescent Health & the Law describes the young people who are aging out of foster care, their health status, and the barriers to health care they face when leaving foster care. It explains how health care access can be improved for this population, by first describing how Medicaid and SCHIP currently reach adolescents and young adults, and how these two programs can be used to help former foster youth. The brief emphasizes, in particular, the important opportunity presented by the Medicaid Expansion Option contained in the Foster Care Independence Act of 1999, and summarizes the policy options that can best improve access to health care for former foster youth.

  • Helping Teens Help Themselves: A National Blueprint for Expanding Access to Supportive Housing Among Pregnant and Parenting Teens Exiting Foster Care
    This national blueprint from the Healthy Teen Network represents a multi-year, multidisciplinary approach to increase supportive housing options for pregnant and parenting teens exiting foster care.

  • HHS Actions Could Improve Coordination of Services and Monitoring of States' Independent Living Programs
    This GAO report reviews the Chafee Foster Care Independence Program and makes recommendations to the Secretary of HHS to improve the availability of information on the array of federal programs that could be used to assist youth transitioning out of foster care at the state and local levels and to improve existing processes for monitoring states' progress in meeting the needs of current and former foster care youth. (Type the report number, GAO-05-25, in the search box at the top of the page.) (November 2004)

  • Finding Funding: Guide to Federal Funding Sources for Youth Programs
    This catalog and guide provides an overview of federal funds that may support youth programming. In addition, the guide highlights youth initiatives that used creative financing strategies to support their programming and offers tips for accessing funds and implementing financing strategies.

  • Transitioning from Foster Care: An Experiential Activity Guidebook
    This guidebook from the University of Southern Maine, Edmund S. Muskie School of Public Service, Institute for Public Sector Innovation is designed for programs who primarily work with youth in and transitioning from foster care. Specific transition activities and facilitation techniques are provided as a resource for program development and/or the enhancement of current program orientation and training.

  • AdvoCasey (Fall 2001/Winter 2002 Issue)
    AdvoCasey is a policy magazine published by the Annie E. Casey Foundation to highlight issues and policies that affect the lives of children and families in the United States. The focus of the Fall 2001 issue is "Foster Teens in Transition: Fostered or Forgotten?"

  • Adolescence and the Transition to Adulthood - Conference Summary
    The transition from adolescence to adulthood is often a tumultuous time for a young person, but it is especially difficult for vulnerable youth - those in foster care, those with health or mental health issues, and those in the juvenile justice or adult correctional systems. The social institutions that support these young adults change considerably. Their support networks of family and kin may be severely strained, or their health or mental health may create barriers to a smooth transition. This summary from Chapin Hall's November 2004 conference, co-sponsored by the MacArthur Research Network on Transitions to Adulthood and Public Policy, synthesizes the research presented and the discussions on program and policy implications of this research. Topics include education, workforce development, civic engagement, and specific issues facing several at-risk populations.

  • It's My Life: Employment
    This handbook from Casey Family Programs is intended for child welfare professionals and others responsible for helping young people prepare for transition to adulthood and the workplace. It provides benchmarks for career exploration and techniques for job seeking. It breaks out the benchmarks by age group and lets young people describe their successes in their own words. It also provides a wealth of links to online tools and assessments and many suggestions for taking advantage of community resources.

  • It's My Life: Housing
    This book provides useful information for child welfare professionals and others who work with youth transitioning to adulthood and independent living. It provides an abundance of Web links to online resources, practical strategies to help young people find, get, and keep housing, and developmentally appropriate strategies for adolescents to young adults. The book provides several recommendations and corresponding strategies to help young people get and keep safe, affordable housing: Start early to build a strong foundation of life skills education and practice; Explore housing options and finances with young people; Make and implement a housing plan that includes contingencies, and follow up; and Develop housing connections in your community to benefit young people transitioning from care.

  • It's My Life: Postsecondary Education and Training
    A resource guide for child welfare professionals to help young people from foster care prepare academically, financially, and emotionally for postsecondary education and training success.

  • Ensuring Safe, Stable and Affordable Housing for Young People Aging Out of Foster Care
    This statement of the National Foster Youth Advisory Council gives ten recommendations for ensuring every youth aging out of foster care has a place to call home, and can serve as a framework for action for agencies seeking to improve outcomes for these young people.

  • Audio: Vulnerable Youth and the Transition to Adulthood
    Listen to this "Thursday's Child" meeting from the Urban Institute and the University of Chicago's Chapin Hall Center for Children. Panelists addressed an array of key questions about the policy and program options for vulnerable teens nearing adulthood, including young people in foster care with no direct family support, those with physical or mental health problems, and youth disconnected from employment and educational opportunities.

  • Audio: Adolescence and the Transition to Adulthood: Rethinking the Safety Net for Vulnerable Young Adults
    Listen to audio recordings from the panel discussions at Chapin Hall's October 18-19, 2006 conference. The conference explored what can be done to strengthen the safety net for vulnerable youth during the transition to adulthood. Youth policy advocates, Congressional staff members, state legislators, reporters and researchers discussed the challenges faced by young people who don't have the financial or emotional support to successfully navigate adult life.


Resources from the States

  • Alaska:
    Alaska Foster Youth and Independent Living Skills: An Examination of the Skills Necessary for Alaskan Youth Transitioning from Office of Children's Services Custody to Independent Living
    This report is comprised of three parts: 1) a qualitative study of independent living skills for Alaskan youth; 2) a compilation of Ansell-Casey Living Skills Assessment (ACLSA) scores for Alaskan youth; and 3) recommendations derived from Parts 1 and 2 regarding transitional services for Alaskan youth in out-of-home care.

  • California:
    Youth Transition Action Teams Guidebook: Leveraging Community Resources to Ensure Successful Transitions for Foster Youth
    This guidebook is designed to help Youth Transition Action Teams in California better serve foster youth, and support their successful transition to adult life. It offers tools, materials, strategies, and community approaches for strengthening a local youth transition system – in California and beyond.

  • District of Columbia:
    Revamping Youth Services: Preparing Young People in Foster Care for Independence. White Paper
    This paper explores the experiences of foster youth in the District of Columbia and the need to provide appropriate services to encourage youth development. Benchmarks are listed for youth development in the areas of case planning/life skills, family/permanent connections, education, employment, health/mental health, and housing.

  • Florida:
    Frequently Asked Questions For Foster Youth Transitioning to Adulthood
    This publication from Florida's Children First answers the most commonly asked questions asked by teens as they figure out their transition to adulthood

  • Idaho:
    Youth Exiting Foster Care: Efficacy of Independent Living Services in the State of Idaho
    A six-year, quantitative, longitudinal research study was conducted in the State of Idaho evaluating the efficacy of independent living services delivered to foster youth who exited care at age 18 between 1996 and 2002. Based on research findings, five key independent living program recommendations are outlined to provide policy makers, researchers, program administrators, and intervention workers with important information to facilitate program change, prevention, implementation, and positive independent living outcomes for foster youth.

  • Illinois:
    Resources to Support Transitioning Needs for Older Youth
    A list of resources, in English and Spanish, including academic checklists, as well as information about medical assistance, employment, education and training vouchers, goal-setting, transition and independent living programs, and housing assistance.

  • Indiana: Independent Living Transition Planning Toolkit
    This toolkit contains planning forms for assisting adolescents in foster care transition to independent living. It begins by explaining the goal of the transition planning conference and participants in the conference. A form for identifying a youth's assets is then provided so that the youth and his or her supporting adults can understand the strengths and weaknesses of the youth. A form for transition planning is also presented to assist youth in developing a plan to transition to their own housing when their case is dismissed at age 18 or older. The toolkit closes with a list of prompt questions for the development of the transition plan.

  • Iowa: Improving Outcomes for Youth in Transition from Foster Care
    This article from the Prevention Report describes current efforts underway in Iowa to improve outcomes for youth through statewide training for child welfare supervisors, caseworkers, and community partners.

  • Michigan:
    Interdepartmental Task Force on Service to At-Risk Youth Transitioning to Adulthood
    The Michigan legislature mandated the creation of a task force to focus on improving outcomes for youths transitioning from foster care. This mandate gave Michigan the opportunity to create a partnership among state agencies, the non-profit sector, advocacy groups and other community and state based organizations to focus on foster youths that is unique in the nation. This report describes the work of the task force.

    How Does Michigan Fare in the Fight to Improve Outcomes for Youth Aging Out of Foster Care?: A Response from the State and One of Its Communities
    This paper in the Fall 2007 issue of the Michigan Child Welfare Law Journal examines how the State of Michigan is seeking to improve outcomes for children aging out of the Michigan child welfare system.

  • New Mexico: Best Practices - Benchmark Hearings
    Benchmark Hearings are court hearings specifically focused on making sure that a young person has a Transitional Living Plan in place to achieve key outcomes for the youth before his/her discharge from foster care. This bulletin outlines best practices and describes the roles of caseworkers, judges, attorneys, court staff, and CASA volunteers.

  • New York City:
    Preparing Youth for Adulthood
    This Administration for Children's Services report focuses on strengthening and expanding supports and services for foster care youth. The initiative shifts the focus from an independent-living to a youth-development framework and establishes six goals for all youth. It requires developing a plan to achieve these goals when the child reaches age 14 and setting and tracking action steps for achieving the goals.

  • Oregon:
    The Juvenile Rights Project has published a number of useful guidebooks, including:
    • A Survival Guide for Teens Aging Out of Foster Care

    • Transition Guide to Teens Aging Out of Foster Care in Oregon: A Guide to Transition Planning for Caseworkers, Judges and Advocates

  • Rhode Island: Building Better Lives for Youth Leaving Foster Care
    This Issue Brief from Rhode Island Kids Count provides facts and statistics about older youth in out-of-home care in Rhode Island, and makes recommendations in the areas of permanency and life-long connections, education, employment and financial security, health, housing and youth involvement.


Research and Studies

  • Aging Out and On Their Own: More Teens Leaving Foster Care Without a Permanent Family
    This report from Kids are Waiting presents state-by-state data on the rising numbers of youth aging out without a safe, permanent family, describes the challenges they face, and recommends federal foster care financing reform as a way to reduce these numbers.

  • Aging Out of the Foster Care System to Adulthood: Findings, Challenges, and Recommendations
    This report from the Joint Center for Political and Economic Studies Health Policy Institute explores the unmet needs of youth who age out of the nation's foster care systems.

  • Assessing Outcomes for Youth Transitioning from Foster Care
    The Utah Department of Human Services reviewed the outcomes of 926 youth who aged out of foster care between 1999 and 2004, and comparing outcomes for those who left care before and after implementation of the Transition to Adult Living Initiative in 2003. This report describes those outcomes, which were mixed, and makes recommendations for further improvement.

  • Evidence-Based Programs for Youth Transitioning to Adulthood
    The California Evidence-Based Clearinghouse has identified programs for young people transitioning to adulthood that can be classified as "acceptable/emerging practices."

  • Coming of Age: Employment Outcomes for Youth Who Age Out of Foster Care Through Their Middle Twenties
    The Department of Health and Human Services (DHHS) Office of the Assistant Secretary for Planning and Evaluation (ASPE) requested this study to examine employment and earnings outcomes for youth, through their mid-twenties, who age out of foster care. The key question and focus of the study is whether foster youth catch up or continue to experience less employment and significantly lower earnings than their peers even into their mid-twenties.

  • Employment Outcomes for Youth Aging Out of Foster Care
    This report from the Chapin Hall Center for Children at the University of Chicago provides information on the employment outcomes of children exiting foster care near their eighteenth birthdays in California, Illinois, and South Carolina during the mid-1990s. It describes when they began to have earnings, in how many quarters over a 13-quarter time period they had earned income, and the amount of earned income they received over that time period. These outcomes are compared to those for youth who were reunified with their parents prior to their eighteenth birthday and to low-income youth. (March 2002) See following item

  • Midwest Evaluation of the Adult Functioning of Former Foster Youth
    Presented here are the first two waves of findings from the Midwest Evaluation of the Adult Functioning of Former Foster Youth, a longitudinal study of youth aging out of foster care and transitioning to adulthood in Iowa, Wisconsin and Illinois. The study is based on survey data that will be collected at three points in time from a sample of youth who were in foster care for at least one year prior to their 16th birthday. The majority of these youth were placed in the care of the state child welfare system due to abuse and neglect.

  • Outcomes for Youth Exiting Care
    Provides a summary of the limited data currently available and addresses anticipated improvements in data collection. From Casey Family Programs National Center for Resource Family Support. (June 2001)

  • Public Shelter Admission among Young Adults with Child Welfare Histories by Type of Service and Type of Exit
    This study examines the prevalence and associated factors of New York City public shelter use among young adults with histories of out-of-home care or nonplacement preventive services as teenagers. The study finds that 19 percent of former child welfare service users entered public shelters within 10 years of exit from child welfare. Persons with out-ofhome placement histories are twice as likely to enter public shelters (22 percent) as those who received nonplacement preventive services only (11 percent). Persons exiting child welfare through absconding from child welfare have the highest rate of shelter use, followed by those discharged to independent living.

  • Northwest Foster Care Alumni Study
    A study by Casey Family Programs, Harvard Medical School, the State of Washington Office of Children's Administration Research, and the State of Oregon Department of Human Services. Few studies have examined how children in foster care have fared as adults, and even fewer studies have identified what changes in foster care services could improve their lives. This study provides new information in both areas.

  • Alaskan Foster Care Alumni Study
    This study examined the outcomes of young adults who had “aged out” of State custody after spending much of their adolescence in foster care. The study team, composed of representatives from the State of Alaska Office of Children's Services, Casey Family Programs, the Tribal-State Collaboration Group, and the University of Alaska Anchorage, sought to answer the following questions about a cohort of Alaskan foster care alumni: where are they living, how they were faring socially, economically, and emotionally, and how do they perceived their experiences in foster care?

  • Transition Planning for Foster Youth
    This study from the Journal for Vocational Special Needs Education evaluated the IEPs/Individualized Transition Plans of 45 students who were in special education and foster care, and compared them to the plans of 45 students who were in special education only. Results indicate that the transition plans of foster youth with disabilities were poor in quality, both in absolute terms and in comparison to youth who are in special education only. The review of transition plans suggests that foster youth may often go through the transition plan process with no parent advocate or educational surrogate, that professionals have limited expectations for foster youth, and that the transition plan document often does not support accountability or serve as a road map for moving into adulthood. The importance of student-directed, meaningful transition planning, services and supports for youth in foster care with disabilities is emphasized. In addition, the need for collaborative efforts between the child welfare system and special education is discussed.

  • Homelessness and Health Care Access After Emancipation: Results From the Midwest Evaluation of Adult Functioning of Former Foster Youth
    Among 345 emancipated participants in this study published in the Archives of Pediatrics & Adolescent Medicine, 14.2% experienced homelessness and 39.4% were unstably housed. Homelessness was associated with being uninsured and having unmet need for health care. Housing status was not associated with reporting fair or poor health at follow-up or, among women, with having had a pregnancy. Conclusion: Having had an episode of homelessness after emancipation is associated with worse health access, but not worse outcomes, among youth emancipated from foster care.

Webcast
  • Keeping Kids in the Child Welfare System After Age 18
    This web seminar, jointly sponsored by Chapin Hall Center for Children and the National Conference of State Legislatures, presents an overview of research and provides state lawmakers, policy-makers, advocates, and others with an opportunity to learn about the experiences of states that allow youth to remain in foster care past their eighteenth birthdays. Originally aired March 1, 2006.

NRCFCPPP Information Packet

PowerPoint Presentation


Websites from the States

  • California: Bust N Out
    This Website was designed to act as an information resource for all youth, youth in foster care and emancipated youth in Butte, Glenn, Colusa, Shasta, Tehama, Lassen, Plumas, Del Norte, Humboldt, Modoc, Siskiyou, Trinity, Lake, Sutter, and Yuba counties so that they can obtain important information regarding many of lifestyle changes they will face once on their own.

  • Florida: Connected by 25
    Cby25 is a community initiative that engages youth, public/private partners and policy makers to improve outcomes for foster youth through investments in services and programs. Their mission is to ensure that foster care youth are educated, housed, banked, employed and connected to a support system by age 25.

  • Michigan: Foster Youth in Transition
    This is a Web site with information on a variety of issues important to current and former foster youth. The site provides links on how to develop supports, find services, get answers to important questions and just keep you posted on what's new. The Web site will be updated by members of Michigan's Youth Boards from locations across the state.

  • New York: Adolescent Services Resource Network
    Funded by the New York State Office of Children and Families and the New York City Administration for Children's Services, the Adolescent Services Resource Network at the Hunter College School of Social Work is a training, technical assistance, and information resource center dedicated to increasing the knowledge and skills of child welfare staff working with youth 14-21 in foster care.

  • Fostering Success
    Fostering Success creates better futures for thousands of foster youth in Middle Tennessee who reach their 18th birthdays while in foster care. It provides opportunities for individuals and organizations throughout the state to support young people in a variety of ways.
National Websites

  • National Resource Center for Youth Development
    The National Resource Center for Youth Development at the University of Oklahoma focuses on increasing the capacity and resources of State, Tribal, and other publicly supported child welfare agencies to effectively meet the needs of youth who will be emancipated from the child welfare system. This will be accomplished by helping adolescents achieve the Adoption and Safe Families Act of 1997 goals of safety, permanency, and well-being through the effective implementation of the John H. Chafee Foster Care Independence Act of 1999 and other related programs.

  • Transition From Foster Care to Adulthood Wiki
    This Wiki has been set up as a space for sharing information about state law and practice regarding foster youths' transition from foster care to adulthood. It allows those with access to information on a specific jurisdiction to make that information easily available to others. This collaborative effort will result in the creation of a convenient, comprehensive, and continually updated resource for finding information on the various legal and practical approaches states have taken regarding the transition from foster care to adulthood.

  • Jim Casey Youth Opportunities Initiative
    The Jim Casey Youth Opportunities Initiative is a national foundation whose mission is to help youth in foster care make successful transitions to adulthood. Formed by two foundations focused on child and youth well-being—The Annie E. Casey Foundation and Casey Family Programs—the Initiative brings together the people and resources needed to help youth make the connections they need to education, employment, health care, housing, and supportive personal and community relationships.

  • Youth Transitions Funders Group
    The Youth Transition Funders Group was formed in 1995 by advocates from foundations dedicated to improving the lives of our nation's most vulnerable young people. Foundations involved in the YTFG are committed to achieving a common mission - ensuring that this nation's young people are successfully connected by age 25 to institutions and support systems that will enable them to succeed throughout adulthood. The YTFG is focusing explicitly on young people ages 14-24 likely to be disconnected from positive personal, family, community, and/or societal involvement because they dropped out of school; had a baby before age 20 without being married; are deeply involved in the juvenile or adult criminal justice system, and/or dropped out or "aged out" of the foster care system. Visit this website to learn more; check out their collection of papers and reports.

  • FYI3.com - Foster Youth Involved, Informed, Independent
    Fyi3.com provides foster youth between ages 14 and 23 opportunities to become involved, informed and independent in their transitioning journey towards adulthood. The website is a partnership project between FosterClub.com and the Jim Casey Youth Opportunities Initiative.

  • Network on Transitions to Adulthood
    The Network on the Transitions to Adulthood, supported by the John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation, examines the changing nature of early adulthood (ages 18-34), and the policies, programs, and institutions that support young people as they move into adulthood.

  • The Forum for Youth Investment
    The Forum is a nonprofit organization dedicated to helping communities and the nation make sure all young people are Ready by 21™ — ready for college, work and life. This goal requires that young people have the supports, opportunities and services needed to prosper and contribute where they live, learn, work, play and make a difference. The Forum provides youth and adult leaders with the information, technical assistance, training, network support and partnership opportunities needed to increase the quality and quantity of youth investment and youth involvement.

  • The Finance Project Connected by 25 Information Resource Center for Youth Transitions Initiatives
    This site provides links to resources on research, best practice, policy and funding as well to organizations working on issues affecting youth in care. It includes resources that specifically address youth aging out of foster care, as well as more general youth resources that can inform the development of supports for youth transitioning from care.

                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                               
Last updated 05/04/08
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