YOUTH AGING OUT OF THE FOSTER CARE SYSTEM
Youth Exiting the Foster Care System in the United States
Kelsey Knox
California State Monterey Bay
Author Note
Kelsey Knox is a Collaborative Health and Human Services major at California State
Monterey Bay. Send correspondences to kknox@csumb.edu.
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YOUTH AGING OUT OF THE FOSTER CARE SYSTEM
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TABLE OF CONTENTS
Introduction
Causes
3
TABLE OF CONTENTS
3-4
Effects
5-6
Solutions
6-7
Conclusion
7
References
8-9
Appendix
10-11
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Introduction
In 2010 there were four hundred and eight thousand children that were in the foster care
system in the United States. Out of that only about twenty five thousand youth aged out. (U.S.
Department of Health and Human Services, 2005) There are many problems facing these
children that are placed in the foster care system. Of course they need a place to live while they
are under the age of eighteen also that they need support from the people that are around them.
They need to be taught the simple skills Another problem is that these youths face once they
leave the foster care system is many find themselves without permanent housing, housing that
they can finally say that it is home and that cannot be taken away from them. In this paper I will
cover why this is a problem for them and some ideas from which we can try to make some
changes for the better. I will be taking on this problem through this report and address the causes,
effects and solutions to youth aging out of the foster care system because aging out of the foster
care problem is a problem for our country.
Causes
“Studies comparing young people leaving foster care without legal permanency to their peers in
the general population indicate that youth formerly in foster care experience less desirable
outcomes.”
The causes of this problem are not enough programs, funding, budgeting and resources.
After they turn eighteen they are simply on their own without any resources from the state.
Because our country is in such a bad state with money we lack in that department which leads to
no funding for the children after they age out. Most of the youth that age out of the system
majority of them are kicked out due to money. The allowance the guardians receive will stop
once they age out which means that the checks stop coming.
Improving Outcomes for Older Youth in Foster Care, which likely indicates that they
experienced more comprehensive independent living preparation, have better employment and
finance outcomes. Youth who have an early encouraging commitment with employment appear
to do better as adults. Evidence from the Midwest study indicates that youth who stay in foster
care beyond age 18 are better across many areas. Current Federal Policies for Youth
Transitioning From Care are the John Chafee Foster Care Independence Program.
In 1999, Congress passed the John H. Chafee Foster Care Independence Program (FCIA),
replacing the Independent Living Program of 1986. FCIA doubled the amount of funding
available for independent living services, from $70 million to $140 million per year, and made
all children, regardless of age and family income, eligible for the program. FCIA also authorized
the use of program dollars to provide housing supports for youth who had aged out of foster care.
However, it limited the amount available for such purposes to 30 percent of overall
funding. The law also gave states the option to extend Medicaid to youth who had aged out of
foster care to age 21. Seventeen states have used the Chafee option to extend coverage, and
officials in another five states reported that they were considering doing so in the near future.
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The federal program offers supportive services to youth, including limited housing
assistance, job training, education, and other independent living services. In 2002, Congress
passed legislation (P.L. 107-133) to authorize an education and training voucher program (worth
up to $5,000 annually per youth) for current and former foster care youth. This program provides
support for postsecondary education to youth who have aged out of foster care and those who
exited foster care to adoption at age 16 and older.
Policy Recommendations In recent years, state and child welfare systems have begun to
recognize the critical need to meet young people’s family permanency needs. State and child
welfare systems have also worked to improve independent living services and expand supportive
housing options for youth aging out of foster care. Too often, however, these initiatives are not
integrated. In fact, in some cases, permanency and preparation for adulthood services are
mutually exclusive or competitive. Federal policy can help support these individual initiatives
and encourage states to integrate these efforts to achieve permanency and instill interdependent
living skills. Changes in three policy areas would help older youth in foster care more
successfully prepare for adulthood: 1. Permanency incentives and the elimination of barriers to
permanency—federal policies that support programs to help older youth achieve permanency
and remove barriers to permanency that currently exist. 2. Ongoing and integrated services and
supports that are youth- and family-centered and driven by their needs in the targeted areas of
housing, health/mental health, education, and employment that includes coordination with other
youth-serving agencies.
“ Youth who age out of the nation’s foster care system are a population at high risk of
having difficulty managing the transition from dependent adolescence to independent of wedlock
parenting, mental-illness, housing instability, and victimization.” (Ossgood.28)
Only about two-fifths of eligible foster children received the federal independent living
services for which they are eligible, according to 2006 data from the Chapin Hall Center for
Children at the University of Chicago. Coordination of service delivery between state and local
providers has been insufficient, and information about the usefulness of available support.
The U.S. foster care system is not consistent, but rather consists of more than 50 separate
systems. Federal and state governments both fund the Chafee Foster Care Independence Program
to provide support to youth aging out of foster care, but each state and area configures and
manages services differently.
Although the legislation creating the Chafee program mandates that outcomes data be
reported for youth receiving independent living services, this mandate has not been implemented.
Published research is limited, with less information available for youth aging out of foster care
than for youth still in the system.
Often times you will see programs that are intended to help youth, but what you don’t see
is programs that directly target this specific target, there are very few out there. With that lack of
these programs the youth turn to a negative pathway.
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Effects
There are numerous effects that are tied into this critical problem. I will be discussing
most of them. The effects are simply how did they end up in the foster care system and youth
delinquency.
Youth end up in the foster system for numerous reasons, they were most likely removed
from their homes because they have experienced trauma, abuse or were neglected by parents. It
also may be the youth’s fault by running away due to their home life. Their homes life can
consist of all kind of problems. They may live with abusive parents or parents that are addicts.
Also their parents’ financial state plays a part on whether the children are capable of living with
their parents. If their parents are not financially stable that leads to hunger, these youth are not
put in the foster care system for no reason.
The children themselves are capable of being the reason why they are in the system. We
all know when we hit our teenage years we get rebellious and feel that we can do whatever we
want. Some youth go to the extreme by being a truant at school or committing crimes, which
leads them to the juvenile system. If they are reoccurring offenders the judge is able to award the
court guardianship and send them to foster care. The court would have to feel that it is in their
best interest for the child to be removed from their parents care.
For years we have had a need to find housing for children that did not have any place to
turn to. In recent years our country has tried to take this very thing with one step at a time. As
they enter the foster system there are benefits for these children. Youths get more one on one
time with adults that care about them. This has been proven to be beneficial to them so that they
can have a role model that they can look up to. They also have Social Workers that look after
their needs while they are in the system. All of this contributes to their overall wellbeing and to
make sure that they feel that they have someone to talk to when they run in to problems in their
lives.
However when they age out of the foster care system they may get less attention from
federal agencies in the form of help. This lack of funds and overall dismissals of these young
adults has contributed to them finding themselves in situation such as teenage pregnancies, abuse
of controlled substances, homelessness, mental illnesses and incarceration. Overall these major
contributing factors add to the hard ships experienced by these young adults even more than
what they have already been exposed to. Not all can count on state services to support them and
help them transition to adult hood. This is where actions need to be taken so that this transition
can be as easy as possible.
Many youth complained about being inappropriately placed into special education classes
that limited their future educational and employment opportunities. They expressed a desire for
more enrichment experiences, such as cultural activities, and more support to help them deal
with anger.
The lack of funding the states have for the population that is aging out of the foster care
system has a major toll on their lives that lead them to youth delinquency. Youth delinquency is
a growing problem in the Untied States. According to the office of juvenile justice youth
delinquency refers to abnormal social or legal behavior by children or adolescents, for dealing
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with juveniles, such as juvenile detention centers. There are a multitude of different theories on
the cause of crime, most if not all of which can be applied to the causes of youth crime.
Delinquent and criminal behavior rises when youth are going through transitions for example,
when the youth age out of foster care they quickly are pushed into adulthood.
Other personal issues that play a role to youth delinquency are poverty, domestic
violence, neglect, trauma, abuse and addiction. Also small roles could be as little as music or
television.
Solutions
In the foster care system there could be many solutions to solving this problem. Providing
support groups for the children could be very beneficial. It would help these children transition in
to their new lives. Skilled counselors that are willing and able to guide the youth in the correct
way would run them. These services would help them tremendously when they age out because
there will be someone there to guide them. Since odds are against them to finding shelter.
Providing extensive training for foster parents would eliminate or reduce homelessness
and other preventable risks. In Texas there is a program implemented for foster care parent to
educate them on why these children enter their care and what they may suffer from. This could
be a very important part of the children’s lives if the foster parent were prepared properly.
There are few types of solutions that are geared toward this population. One is that when
they leave the foster care system they go to college and the state will cover all of their expenses.
What is more is that when the children come back from college on break then the foster parents
can still host and feed them. Also if these campuses worked together to allow foster children to
attend then in return there’s some type of funding. However there are a few flaws with this idea.
The first one is that many who leave the foster system before the graduate will drop out of high
school. The second is that many do not receive a proper education upon leaving their foster home
and are not prepared for the environment of college.
Allowing these children to remain on care until 21 would decrease these youth choosing
the wrong path. Effective October 2010, The Foster Connections to Success and Increasing
Adoptions Act extended eligibility for Title IV-E payments to age 21. This change allows states
to now extend payments for young people in foster care and adoptive or guardianship placement
when certain employment and education or training requirements are met. As of mid-April
2011, twelve states had submitted Title IV-E plan amendments indicating that they intend to
exercise the option to provide foster care to some or all of the older youth in foster care who
meet federal eligibility requirements. Three of these states have had their plan amendments
approved by the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services and the remaining nine have
plan amendments under review or revision. As states develop a system of care for young people
in extended foster care, the design should target the unique needs of this young adult population
rather than be a mere extension of the current foster care system.
Another one is the Independent Living Program or ILP, which is when the youth will
have to be either in school full time or work full time or both in order to qualify for this program.
They would be required to see their caseworkers twice a month so that they can be sure that they
secure appropriate housing. This has also proven to be an effective way to help these youth to
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transition into living by their selves. There has been some government opposition to these types
of programs because they think that the money could be better used elsewhere despite the fact
that they have been proven effective.
Extending independent living services, case and permanency planning, placement, and
judicial oversight to age 21, in developmentally appropriate ways, benefits young people who
urgently need continued support and services. Most directly, extended care can provide safe and
stable housing for young people that have not achieved permanence by age 18 and are not ready
to be on their own. As one young woman from Rhode Island stated, "Things were rough for me.
If I had not had to help me with schooling and housing after age 18, I may not have made it."
There is evidence from the Midwest Study, a sample of young adults as they age out of
foster care and transition to adulthood, that young adults who remain in care until age 21 have
better outcomes in several areas when they leave foster care than those who left at age 18. Two
additional studies analyzing the data from the Midwest have shown that homelessness is reduced
and educational attainment is increased which results in higher lifetime earnings. Another study
analyzing data on young adults in Washington State demonstrated that in addition to attending
college longer, young people in extended care received food stamps for fewer total months and
were less likely to be arrested for a misdemeanor or felony crime.
Overall the best solution would be to provide housing to youth after they age out of the
system. It will help the secure permanent housing allowing them to be on their own feet with
decisions they make on their own. Also being able to improve the system by providing training
and background checks for those that want to become foster parents.
Conclusion
In conclusion the foster care system is full of problems, but the youth have access to a
home, healthcare and various resources while in the system. Throughout this process of being in
the foster care system the children are forced to face problems that will ultimately have them
grow up fast. They often feel that they are alone and no one is there to support, love or care for
them. I feel that we need to conquer this problem that is growing by giving them what they need
to succeed. With more funding to the states and also providing more access to programs
specifically for them I believe we can lower the statistics and the odds that society sets against
them. However upon the age of 18, foster children age out and many are left to fend for
themselves become homeless or turn to a life of crime. This is the error with the aging out
process.
Without any access to resources after aging out of the foster care system youth
delinquency is their last resort. They are forced into adulthood with the proper education, support
or life lessons.
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References
A Population at Risk: Youth "Aging Out" of the Foster Care System and Implications for
Extension . (n.d.). The Journal of Extension ( JOE ) . Retrieved November 1, 2012, from
http://www.joe.org/joe/2008august/iw3.php
Berkeley Center for Criminal Justice (2010). Mental health issues in California’s
juvenile justice system. Retrieved from: http://www.law.berkeley.edu/
Bill Baccaglini: The "Aging Out" Dilemma Plaguing the Foster Care System. (n.d.). Breaking
News and Opinion on The Huffington Post. Retrieved November 1, 2012, from
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/bill-baccaglini/the-aging-out-dilemma-fostercare_b_978363.html
Child Welfare League of America: Practice Areas: Family Foster Care: Critical Issues: Programs
and Resources for Youth Aging Out of Foster Care. (n.d.). Child Welfare League of
America. Retrieved November 1, 2012, from
http://www.cwla.org/programs/fostercare/agingoutresources.htm
Dworsky, A. & Courtney, M. E. (2010). Does Extending Foster Care beyond Age 18 Promote
Postsecondary Educational Attainment? Emerging Findings from the Midwest Study.
Chicago: Chapin Hall at the University of Chicago
Fessler, P. (n.d.). Report: Foster Kids Face Tough Times After Age 18 : NPR. NPR : National
Public Radio : News & Analysis, World, US, Music & Arts : NPR. Retrieved November
1, 2012, from http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=125594259
Foster Care Statistics 2010. (n.d.). Child Welfare Information Gateway. Retrieved November 1,
2012, from http://www.childwelfare.gov/pubs/factsheets/foster.cfm
Gardner, D. (2008). Youth Aging Out of Foster Care Identifying Strategies and Best Practices.
Washington, D.C.: the Research Division of NACo’s County Services Department.
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Malia, C., & Boston, M. (2007). Aging Out of the Foster Care System to Adulthood: Findings,
Challenges, and Recommendations. Washington, D.C.: Health Policy Institute.
Osgood, D. W. (2005). On your own without a net: the transition to adulthood for vulnerable
populations. Chicago: University of Chicago Press
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Appendix
1.1
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1.2