New NCSL Book
Guiding the Young and Dispossessed
Toward a Productive Life
If you've spent time in a large city recently, you've seen them: thin, disheveled, unkempt, huddling in groups, hanging out in alleys and byways, sleeping in parks. They are the young, the dispossessed. They are some of the 24,000 "street kids" who have either outgrown the system (reached the age of emancipation) or run away from a foster care family.
What's to be done with these young people? The detriments of long-term out-of-home placement have been documented: poor school performance, few of the skills needed for every-day life in today's world and limited chances of success. Foster care kids, upon emancipation or running away from a home, risk unemployment, poor health, increased jail time and the temptations of drug and alcohol abuse.
Today, however, there's more hope than ever. "Independent living programs" have been created to foster the skills young people will need for successful life in the outside world: using a household budget, finding housing, continuing education, training for a job, obtaining health care and myriad other "real world" skills.
A new publication, Independent Living for Foster Youth by the National Conference of State Legislatures, takes a look at these programs and the youth they serve, examines new opportunities available under the Federal Foster Care Independence Act and highlights state efforts to provide health care, education and housing assistance to independent and former foster youth.
It's well worth a look by those concerned with the future of a generation of young people.
Independent Living for Foster Youth, Christine Eilertson; February 2002, 68 pages; ISBN1-58024-209-X, Item #6315; $20. To order, send e-mail to books@ncsl.org; call Rita Morris, NCSL Marketing Department, (303) 830-2054, or fax (303) 863-8003.
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