On Their Own: What Happens To Kids When They Age Out Of The Foster Care System
A Adoption, Social Movements, Family Law book. Try to imagine that you have just turned eighteen and have been put out of your foster home. You may...
Each year, as many as 25,000 teenagers "age out" of foster care, usually when they turn eighteen. For years, a government agency had made every important decision for them. Suddenly, they are on their own, with no one to count on. What does it mean to be eighteen and on your own, without the family support and personal connections that most young people rely on? For many youth raised in foster care, it means largely unhappy endings, including sudden homelessness, unemployment, dead-end jobs, loneliness, and despair. On Their Own tells the compelling stories of ten young people whose lives are full of promise, but who face economic and social barriers stemming from the disruptions of foster care. This book calls for action to provide youth in foster care the same opportunities on the road to adulthood that most of our youth take for granted-access to higher education, vocational training, medical care, housing, and relationships within their communities....
Download or read On Their Own: What Happens To Kids When They Age Out Of The Foster Care System in PDF formats. You may also find other subjects related with On Their Own: What Happens To Kids When They Age Out Of The Foster Care System.
- Filetype: PDF
- Pages: 320 pages
- ISBN: 9780813341804 / 813341809
BkjCGleCsuZ.pdf
More About On Their Own: What Happens To Kids When They Age Out Of The Foster Care System
Try to imagine that you have just turned eighteen and have been put out of your foster home. You may have amassed some savings from a part-time job and received a one-time emancipation grant, but you dont have a job. You have no idea where youll sleep tonight, let alone next week or next month. Your belongings are packed into two plastic bags. Your family is unable to help, and may even have disappeared. Further clouding your prospects are your educational deficits and a history of trouble with the law. You read at a seventh grade level. You were held... Although white children and African American children land in foster care in roughly equal numbers, African American children are disproportionately likely both to enter foster care and to remain there until they become adults, a troubling phenomenon. African American children account for only 15 percent of all children in the United States, but they accounted for 27 percent of those entering care in 2003 (the last year for which national data are available) and 35 percent of those in care.8 Martha Shirk, On Their Own: What Happens to Kids When They... Although the rise in overall numbers has made it increasingly difficult to find family settings for all ages of children, this is especially true for teenagers. They are by nature rebellious and difficult to work with, so relatively few foster families are willing to try. As a result, only 60 percent of children fourteen and older live in foster or pre-adoptive homes, compared with more than 90 percent of younger children. Martha Shirk, On Their Own: What Happens to Kids When They Age Out of the Foster Care System //
very interesting - some sad but often really inspiring! I already know what happens to youth when they age out of the foster care system from my work but I appreciated reading these stories, statistics and recommendations for creating change. Heartbreaking and important book
