Tools and Links to Related Materials

Tools

Foster Youth Enrollment Letter Antelope Valley Union High School District Centinela Valley Covina-Valley Unified School District Eastside Union School District El Monte Union High School District Garvey School District Keppel Union School District LACo Office of Education Lancaster School District LA Unified School District Lenox School District Little Lake City School District Long Beach Unified School District Pasadena Unified School District Pomona Unified School District Torrance Unified School District Whittier City School District

A helpful tool for caregivers trying to enroll their foster youth in the public school system, this letter outlines the applicable law and what rules school administrators need to follow when enrolling these youth. Select your district from the scrolling menu or click on the menu title to see all the available letters.

  CA Education Law Fact Sheets 2008
These are the latest facts sheets developed by the CA Foster Youth Education Task Force. Here, you will find the latest legal information about: AB 490, Education Rights, Special Education, Nonpublic Schools (NPS), AB 3632, Functional Behavioral Assessments (FBA), Behavioral Intervention Plans (BIP), School Discipline, and Special Education Discipline.

County of Los Angeles Probation Department Education Reform Project
The report concerning the approval of comprehensive educational reform recommendations and a preliminary action plan for implementation at probation camps and juvenile halls.

Download PDF file here:

H.R. 6893 Fact Sheet
H.R. 6893, the Fostering Connections to Success and Increasing Adoptions Act of 2008, was one of several recent bills signed by the President. This will open the door to federal support for youth to age 21-- ending the trend in many states to push youth out of foster care at 18. Other provisions in the bill will enhance the ability to find, approve and support relative caregivers, increase efforts to preserve sibling ties, and mandate better attention to the educational and health needs of youth in care.
Download a summary of the key provisions in the bill in PDF format:

Keys to Creating Standards-based IEPs
The Special EDge is a newsletter published three times a year and funded by the California Department of Education, Special Education Division. The Special EDge is designed to inform and support parents, educators, and other service providers on special education topics, focusing on research-based practices, legislation, technical support, and current resources. This issue contains useful information related to Individualized Education Plans (IEPs).
Download this issue in PDF format:  

Stuart Foundation: Teacher Voices
Some of the nation’s leading scholars and philanthropic organizations selected a dozen foster care experts to discuss what we know — and don’t know — about improving educational outcomes for children and youth in foster care. These experts represent a wide range of experience and perspective including that of an urban county school superintendent, a juvenile court judge, an attorney, a pediatric mental health clinician, a social service director, and several university-based researchers.
Ready to Succeed is a bold plan to close the educational achievement gap for children and youth in foster care. Based upon the best research available, it designs and tests interventions at demonstration sites, assists policymakers and practitioners to carry out promising policies and practices, and addresses data collection and sharing challenges. Likewise, it is a call for more and better
research to strengthen the evidence for what works.
Grappling with the Gaps is a starting place. It sets the groundwork to suggest new research priorities for improving policies and practices related to the educational outcomes of children and youth in foster care. Its sole source of information is interviews conducted during the winter of 2009 with 12 foster care experts who differ in familiarity with education, child welfare, and related policy and practice issues. Collectively they describe “research lags,” “holes,” “gaps in knowledge,” “a paucity of research on educational outcomes,” and “lack of evidence-based practices” contributing to the generally dismal educational outcomes Ready to Succeed aims to turn around.

Download Ready to Succeed in PDF format: 

DownloadGrappling with the Gapsin PDF format: 

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Ward of the Court Status Verification
for those Applying for College:

Proof of Foster Care Status
A list of the two types of verification of your foster care status that college student financial aid offices will accept, with explanations.

Filling out the Free Application for Federal Student Aid (FAFSA)
If you are living with a legal guardian and want to know whether or not you can be considered a "ward of the court" on the FAFSA application, read these guidelines.

Sample Ward of the Court Verification Letter
If you need verification of your "ward of the court" status for the purposes of applying for financial aid for college, give this sample letter to your social worker. This is the only information that the school's financial aid office is required to have.

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