Tagged With "foster"

Registration is now open for the 8th Annual Foster Care Youth Conference! The conference is open to all foster care and transitional aged youth (ages 14-24) in Alameda, Contra Costa, Solano or Yolo counties. The conference will provide approximately 150 foster care/kinship and transitioning youth with an opportunity to participate in workshops covering resumes and interviewing, communication, trade demos, hair and barbering, fashion, art and sports. Eligible youth will receive a stipend for...

By Theresa Walker, The Orange County Register, December 20, 2019 For three years after he aged out of foster care, at age 18, Christian was homeless. During that time, he was hit by a car and suffered a traumatic brain injury. He was in a coma for six months and his speech and memory were affected. Over most of the last year he’s lived at The Link, a homeless shelter in Santa Ana. This week, Christian, now 22, moved into his own one-bedroom apartment, in Tustin. That change is the result of...

Struggling with how to Foster Equity Conversations in Community? Join the national partners of the Building Community Resilience Networks as we share our lessons learned in fostering equity as a strategy to prevent childhood adversity and build community resilience. Wednesday, February 26th 12pm-1:15pm Eastern More info at go.gwu.edu/EquityWebinar As a nation we have agonized over how to approach conversations on race, racism, inequity and racial justice. Too often we have opted to attempt...

By Erica Hellerstein, The Mercury News, January 13, 2020 When Dontae Lartigue left foster care right before his 19th birthday in 2009, finding housing in Santa Clara County was one of his biggest obstacles. He struggled to find places he could afford on his $12 an hour salary at Walmart, and with a limited income and no rental history, he found landlords were often wary of returning his calls. So Lartigue, who is now 29 years old, ended up couch surfing or sleeping in his car. “Right now...

KQED is the National Public Radio affiliate in San Francisco, CA. We’d like to hear from adults (18+) who were separated from their parents when they were children. Perhaps the separation was due to economic reasons, war and conflict, incarceration, foster care, or something else. How did that period of separation impact you in the long-run? How has it impacted your connection to others and how you build relationships? If you're a parent, how does it influence how you parent? We’re...

The deadline to show your support for the Family Urgent Response System (FURs) is just ONE WEEK away! Please take a couple of minutes to sign on to ensure kids in foster care and their caregivers have the supports and services that are needed to strengthen their bond and create a stable, healing environment. If you're having trouble accessing the link above, copy and paste this URL into your browser:...

By Karen de Sa and John Kelly, The Chronicle of Social Change, February 5, 2020 A California senator introduced groundbreaking legislation this week to extend the state’s foster care system through age 25 – a bill that acknowledges the continued failure to prepare young people severed from families for life on their own. The early-stage Senate Bill 912 has few details yet available, and no price tag. But its lofty aim would make California the first state to expand such support and services...

Kids in foster care have experienced significant trauma from abuse and neglect and, as a result, often need mental health services. Yet too often, kids in foster care and their caregivers are left to navigate triggering events and conflicts on their own, even though immediate professional support is critical in times of crisis. Tell our state’s leaders to support a common sense solution – a toll-free hotline, available 24/7, so caregivers and kids in foster care, who are experiencing...

From Pasadena Now, March 9, 2020 As upwards of 18,000 children now move through the LA County Foster Care system, it has long meant that those young people may continually bounce from home to home, with an ever-dwindling number of care providers among the County’s 88 cities. But now the State is almost three years into implementing a new system with one simple goal—to move foster children into “forever families,” or long-term homes, more swiftly. The lofty aim requires a massive budget, a...

By Susan Abram, The Chronicle of Social Change, November 14, 2019 In the eastern suburbs of Sacramento County, Kamika Hebbert keeps a watchful eye for signs of how an unstable environment affects young minds. There’s the restlessness that comes with worry about biological parents and siblings. The thousand-mile stare that comes with trauma. The mouthing off and anger that comes with fear of being placed with another family or moved to another group home. “I’ve had kids who have moved to 17...

From ACEs Aware, March 3, 2020 The webinar will provide an overview of trauma-informed care principles that can facilitate integrating screening and response for ACEs and enhance connections between patients and providers. Key elements of “ Fostering Resilience and Recovery: A Change Package for Advancing Trauma-Informed Primary Care ” will be presented. This is the second in a series of educational webinars that will offer practical information to help providers integrate ACE screening and...

In 2019, more than $40 million will become available to fund community-based, culturally rooted, trauma-informed services for youth in California as alternatives to arrest and incarceration. Thousands of California youth are arrested every year for low-level offenses. Youth who are arrested or incarcerated for low-level offenses are less likely to graduate high school, more likely to suffer negative health-outcomes, and more likely to have later contact with the justice system.

By Sacramento County, SacCounty News, January 9, 2020 To recruit more loving families for children in foster care, Sacramento County is making it easier to find and afford childcare services for resource families. The Emergency Child Care Bridge Program’s goal is to increase the number of resource families for children in foster care by helping families find the right child care provider, connecting families to long-term child care subsidies, and by providing vouchers to pay for childcare...

By Jeremy Loudenback, The Chronicle of Social Change, November 15, 2019 The Los Angeles County Board of Supervisors voted to boost housing options for transition-age foster youth at its meeting on Tuesday. Two separate investments totaling nearly $9.4 million will open up 237 transitional beds for foster youth at the greatest risk of homelessness over the next year. “Youth transitioning out of foster care have often experienced significant trauma throughout their young lives,” said...

Placer County Office of Education (COE) and Sacramento COE are hosting a Foster & Homeless Legislative Training on October 21, 2019 in Sacramento. Spaces are still available and the registration link is included in the attached flyer. Focus of Training: Learn about state and federal laws intended to improve educational opportunities, school stability, and academic/social outcomes for foster and homeless youth, from legal experts at the National Center for Youth Law. Target Audience: •...

By YourCentralValley.com Staff, February 5, 2020 Merced College celebrated the grand opening on Wednesday of the NextUp Center to support current and former foster youth under the age of 26. Merced College says it was one of 45 community colleges to receive a NextUp grant from California Community Colleges in the amount of $643,840 to establish the program which offers support and resources including academic and vocational counseling, meal and gas cards, educational supplies, and more.

By Nathalie Vera, KEYT, December 11, 2019 In Santa Barbara County, 80 percent of children in the foster care system are there because of the drug epidemic, including opioids. “When parents become addicted, the kids are the ones that are paying the price," said Kim Colby Davis, executive director at CASA (Court Appointed Special Advocates) of Santa Barbara County. “More and more frequently we're seeing heroine, and we're seeing the opioid addictions.” CASA volunteers help the courts decide on...

May is National Foster Care Month. If foster youth are not reunified with their families or adopted by age 21, youth “age out” of the state’s foster care system and services often end abruptly. In 2015, more than 14,000 California foster youth—nearly a quarter of all those in care statewide—were between the ages of 16 and 20 years old.

By Zaidee Stavely, EdSource, October 3, 2019 It only takes one healthy relationship with a caring adult to help a child heal from trauma. That’s one of the main messages in a series of classes given to child care providers across California that help them work with children who have experienced abuse, violence, family separation or other trauma. The classes are part of a state program called the Emergency Child Care Bridge Program for Foster Children, which California began in 2018 to help...

So, different situation but my bio Dad left when I was 2. And things went to sh*t after that. Having my bio mom work constantly to support us, she was gone all the time too. Which left us open to daily abuse and targeted by sex offenders.

We need this if CCCounty doesn’t have it already Patricia Duncan Hall, MA Social Casework Assistant Contra Costa County CFS-Court Unit 510.231.8153 [cid:image001.jpg@01D27234.A61D0030]< http://www.ehsd.org/ >[cid:image002.png@01D27234.A61D0030]< https://www.facebook.com/Contr...10623/?hc_ref=SEARCH >[cid:image003.png@01D27234.A61D0030]< https://twitter.com/ContraCostaEHSD >

Hi Patricia, Contra Costa County is participating in the Bridge program. I recommend reaching out to Margaret Wiegert Jacobs ( mjacobs@cocokids.org ) at CocoKids (Contra Costa's resource and referral agency) if you're interested in learning more about the program and how it's implemented there. Best, Gemma

By Laura Packard Tucker, Amy Dworsky, and Molly (Mayer) Van Drunen, Chapin Hall at The University of Chicago, June 2020 The Youth Transitions Partnership (YTP) blends service coordination, intensive case management, and Dialectical Behavior Therapy (DBT) to help transition age youth in foster care in Alameda County, CA engage with support systems and improve their outcomes. YTP was funded by the Children’s Bureau Youth At-Risk of Homelessness (YARH) grant program. This brief describes the...

By Claudia Boyd-Barrett, California Health Report, June 22, 2020 At the beginning of March, Monse Gonzalez had her entire year planned. She would graduate from community college, save part of her paychecks as a childcare worker, and start school at the University of Santa Barbara. Then came the pandemic. Suddenly, everything Gonzalez, 18, had worked for was in jeopardy: her job, her housing, her associates degree. While many young adults have families to lean on during these uncertain times,...

https://static1.squarespace.com/static/58eeb29cdb29d6de1df8ac76/t/5ed85f5b4c61935658893996/1591238520469/Youth+Listening+Sessions+Report.pdf Justin Martinez, 29, will be a first-generation graduate when he earns his psychology degree from San Francisco State University this month. Martinez was formerly a foster child and shared his story at a Youth Listening Session , an event where young people in the foster care and juvenile justice systems engage in honest dialogue and self-expression.

See attached flyer for 24/7 Support for foster youth.