Higher Education Opportunities for Foster Youth, a report by The Institute for Higher Education Policy

A Forum — February 10, 2006

Background: Few Foster Youths Pursue Higher Education

• At any given time, approximately 300,000 American youths in the prime college-going years between the ages of 18 and 25 have aged out of foster care at age 18 or spent at least one year in foster care after age 12

• If foster youth completed high school and entered higher education at the same rate as their peers, roughly an additional 100,000 of foster youth would be attending colleges or technical schools. Currently, only 30,000 are participating in postsecondary education.

• Too few foster youth finish high school. About 150,000 foster youth have earned a high school diploma or the equivalent, such as a GED. Their 50% completion rate is lower than the 70% on-time graduation rate with a high school diploma for all youths.
• Moreover, too few who do finish high school go on to higher education. Only 30,000 of those foster youth (20% of the high school completers) have gone on to higher education, compared to 60% of all on-time high school graduates.

This forum highlighted the size of the gap in postsecondary educational participation between foster youth and their peers, the reasons for the gap, and ways to close it, as documented in Higher Education Opportunities for Foster Youth: A Primer for Policymakers, a study released in December 2005 by the Institute for Higher Education Policy (IHEP).

Jamie Merisotis, President of IHEP, said the study, sponsored by his nonprofit, nonpartisan research and policy organization in Washington, D.C., is part of a project, Changing Dimensions of Disadvantage in American Higher Education, funded by the Ford Foundation. He said the project explores the specific experiences of foster youth and other underserved groups within the context of the broader barriers related to income and race, and suggests way to stimulate action to keep the groups from slipping through the cracks of postsecondary educational opportunities.

Thomas Wolanin, Senior Associate at IHEP and author of the report, said there is little reliable national data about the postsecondary educational experiences of young people who age out of the foster care system, typically at age 18. Lack of data, he said, helps explain why their low participation rates have been “relatively unexplored and somewhat invisible in policy-making discussions.” For example, the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) has yet to implement a data collection system mandated by  law in 2001. HHS was to start tracking the educational outcomes and other measures of the performance of states operating federally subsidized independent living programs for young people transitioning out of their status as “wards or dependents of the court.” 

Wolanin said research literature and a variety of state, regional, federal, and academic data collections show that only 30,000 of the 300,000 youths between 18 and 25 who have had significant experience within the foster care system participate in formal trade or collegiate education after leaving high school. Completion rates are abysmal; only one to five out of every 100 foster youths who enter a four-year program earns a degree.

Reasons for the Gap

The gap arises partly because children in foster care have undergone two traumas: they were found to be neglected or abused by their family and subsequently removed from their home and parents by strange adults. Approximately one-third of foster youth face a third trauma, abuse and neglect at their placement within the foster care system.

For most, the process of separation and readjustment is repeated frequently. Foster youth are shuttled from placement to placement, changing caretakers (and often schools) on average every six months, and half spend at least 18 months in foster care. The clothing and personal effects in their backpack or trash bag can be the only stable element in their environment. Even though more than half eventually return to their families, one-third of those who are reunited return to the foster care system. Some young people have had as many as many as 10 or 20 placements; one child had 71 different placements.

In the report, Wolanin concentrated on alumni of the foster care system whose stays in foster care were late enough or long enough to have a dramatic effect on their first years as independent adults. All were former wards of the court between the ages of 18 and 25 who either had been in foster care until they aged out of the system, or had spent at least one of their teenage years in foster care.

The foster youth were disproportionately poor or African American. Beyond the broad barriers associated with socio-economic factors, he found other factors that contributed to their low rate of participation in postsecondary education. He said the primary factors are (1) lack of adult life skills, (2) poor mental health, (3) low levels of attainment and achievement in K-12 schools, and (4) non-academic barriers, including lack of cultural support, mentors and role models, information and finances. Wolanin said each factor could be mitigated by policy changes.

Ways To Close The Gap

Adult Life Skills. Foster youth are far more likely than their peers to lack adult competencies that are customarily acquired from one’s parents, such as how to feed, cook for, cloth or advocate for yourself, shop for groceries, manage finances, support yourself in legal employment, and keep to schedules. Their ties with teachers, overburdened social workers and school counselors, juvenile justice officials, undertrained foster parents and other adults during their foster care years are often broken by turnover among providers, placement changes, and lack of coordination among those responsible for helping them.

What can be done? Recommended policy changes include reorganization of fragmented transition programs, more cooperation among government agencies, and implementation, at long last, of the law that requires HHS to evaluate independent living programs and to publicize best practices. Services intended to prepare foster youth for the transition into independence now begin at 16 and usually extend to the age of 21; it would be wise to extend the cut-off in state and federal programs to 24, which is already the age at which student-aid programs assume that a child should no longer be dependent on parents.

Mental Health. More than half of foster youth have diagnosed mental or emotional problems, often traceable to abuse and neglect. The most common diagnosis is post-traumatic stress disorder, followed by depression, anxiety, and social phobias. The rate is twice that of the general population, and they have more severe problems, receive less treatment, and therefore have lower recovery rates.

What can be done? Today, instead of cutting off eligible children’s Medicaid coverage at the age of 18, more than 30 states have exercised their option of extending coverage by the federal-state program until the age of 21. Making extensions mandatory, and adding coverage – including mental health services – until the age of 24, would help, Wolanin said. In addition, services provided for older and former foster care children by states under the federal government’s Chafee Foster Care Independence Program should include a focus on practical activities, such as keeping appointments and sticking to a regime of medication that adults use to manage their own health.

Secondary education preparation. Foster children are less likely than their peers to graduate from high school. These highly mobile children have higher rates of tardiness, absence, truancy, suspensions, expulsions, course failures, and assignment to “alternative” or “continuing” schools with undemanding curricula that leave students unprepared for higher education. They also have lower grade point averages and less chance for long-term connections with caring adults as they move from school to school.

What can be done? The K-12 educators should prepare foster children for postsecondary education and establish a preference for mainstream placement, parallel to that for students with disabilities. Caretaking agencies and school systems should minimize placement changes and school changes, avoid pulling a student out of class for appointments, and arrange for residential changes that require school transfers to take place during summers or between semesters. Judges, juvenile justice officials, and social workers – who too often act as if schools alone are responsible for a child’s educational achievement, attainment and expectations – should update their professional goals, which emphasize the safety of the child, to also emphasize their own duty to fulfill the parental role as the child’s primary educator.

Non-Academic Barriers. Too few of the foster children who do complete high school in the compulsory education system apply for entry into the voluntary system of postsecondary education. Low expectations by their caretakers and low self-esteem among foster children play a part. So does lack of information or counseling from a trusted mentor or role model on how to apply, lack of assistance in choosing a field of studies or institution, and lack of information on how to obtain financial aid (including Pell Grants and Education Transition Vouchers under the Chafee Act). Lack of knowledge of how to navigate within the higher education system also helps explain why only a minuscule percentage of foster youth persist to the end of their course of studies.

What can be done? Raise expectations and pre-collegiate training in the K-12 system to overcome the psychological, social, and bureaucratic obstacles to higher education opportunities. Increase funding for financial aid, counseling, and student services in the secondary and postsecondary systems. Simplify and consolidate scattered programs and procedures that complicate the process of obtaining benefits and education.

Erin Renner, Assistant Director of the U.S. Department of Education’s Advisory Committee on Student Financial Assistance, said the IHEP report reinforces recommendations made by the Advisory Committee, an independent, bi-partisan committee that advises Congress and the Secretary of Education on policies to overcome the finance-related, non-academic barriers to participation in higher education. She said several of the Advisory Committee’s recommendations have been incorporated in legislation currently pending in Congress, primarily in the House-passed and Senate-passed bills reauthorizing the Higher Education Act, or in amendments that may be incorporated in the final version.

She said that increasing need-based grant aid is primary to increasing access to higher education for low-income foster youth. But, the Advisory Committee has also offered several other suggestions that would not require increased funding. For example, the Committee recommended simplifying and streamlining the financial aid application process for students with special circumstances, like foster care youth, and amending the application form and student guide for the Department of Education’s financial aid programs to clearly indicate the eligibility of foster youth for independent adult status. In addition, Ms. Renner described other provisions included in HEA reauthorization that would reduce non-academic barriers to college for foster youth, including ensuring that the TRIO,GEAR UP, and Student Support Services programs be specifically designed to serve the special needs of foster youth, and alerting institutions of higher education to some of the special needs of foster youth, such as a place to live during semester breaks. Never again, she said, should it be necessary for a foster youth in a residential college to spend the Christmas break sleeping in his used car, a story told in the IHEP report

Resources

The report, Higher Education Opportunities for Foster Youth, can be downloaded at http://www.ihep.com/

Summary of Recommendations from Advisory Committee on Student Financial Assistance

Presenters

Jamie P. Merisotis is the founding President of the Institute for Higher Education Policy. Established in 1993 in Washington, DC, the Institute is regarded as one of the world’s premier research and policy organizations concerned with higher education policy development. As the Institute’s President, Mr. Merisotis has worked extensively on nearly every aspect of the Institute’s work. He is recognized as a leading authority on college and university financing, particularly student financial aid, and has published major studies and reports on topics ranging from higher education ranking systems to technology-based learning.

A champion of the idea that higher education reaps rich rewards for both society and individuals, Jamie Merisotis has focused much of his work on improving access to higher education for low-income, minority, and other underrepresented populations. This commitment to equality of opportunity was a major factor in the establishment of the Alliance for Equity in Higher Education, an unprecedented coalition of national associations that represent more than 350 minority-serving colleges and universities, including Historically Black Colleges and Universities, American Indian Tribal Colleges, and Hispanic-Serving Institutions. Founded in 1999, the Alliance serves as a leading voice for the interests of minority-serving institutions (MSIs) and has become a model of collaboration, unity, and innovation among communities of color. Mr. Merisotis serves as the coordinator and facilitator of the Alliance and is director of the Kellogg MSI Leadership Fellows Program, a year-long, intensive program designed to train the next generation of presidents at MSIs.

Mr. Merisotis also manages the Institute’s growing global portfolio, working to further educational opportunity and access primarily in nations in transition, such as in southern Africa and the former Soviet Union. He has served as advisor to governments and institutions in several nations, and is actively engaged in the global dialogue about higher education “massification” and the implications that increasing educational opportunities could have on economic, social, and cultural development.

Prior to founding the Institute, Mr. Merisotis served as Executive Director of the National Commission on Responsibilities for Financing Postsecondary Education, a bipartisan commission appointed by the President and the Congressional leadership. He authored the Commission's heralded final report, Making College Affordable Again, many of whose recommendations became national policy during the 1990s. He also assisted in the creation of the Corporation for National and Community Service (AmeriCorps), serving as advisor to senior management on issues related to the quality and impact of national service initiatives. From 1993 to 1997 Mr. Merisotis coordinated site-based evaluations that reviewed more than 100 AmeriCorps projects.

Mr. Merisotis is extensively published in the higher education field. He has authored and edited several books and monographs, and is a frequent contributor to magazines, journals, and newspapers. His writing has appeared in the Washington Post, the (London) Times Higher Education Supplement, the Chronicle of Higher Education, Higher Education in Europe, Review of Higher Education, and other periodicals.

Since October 1996, Thomas Wolanin has been a Senior Associate at The Institute for Higher Education Policy, focusing on issues concerning postsecondary education financing, higher education governance, student access and equity and international education. 

Prior to joining The Institute, he served as Deputy Assistant Secretary for Legislation and Congressional Affairs at the U.S. Department of Education under Secretary of Education Richard W. Riley.  In that position, he worked on the enactment of the President's education program, including the Federal Direct Loan Program, GOALS 2000: Educate America Act, the Improving America's Schools Act and the School-to-Work Opportunities Act.  

Wolanin's career has included service as Staff Director of the Subcommittee on Postsecondary Education in the U.S. House of Representatives.  In that capacity, he managed the reauthorizations of the Higher Education Act in 1980, 1986 and 1992 under the leadership of Chairman William D. Ford.  He also served in a variety of other legislative positions in the Congress and did staff work on the reauthorizations of the Higher Education Act in 1972 and 1976 and the Middle Income Student Assistance Act in 1978.  He played a major staff role in the enactment of the Tech-Prep Education Act in 1990.

Wolanin's academic career has included teaching positions at George Washington University, the University of Wisconsin-Madison and Oberlin College.  He also served as Executive Assistant to the President at New York University.  He has published widely, including works on education policy, international education and American politics.   He has received a number of awards, including election to Phi Beta Kappa and a Woodrow Wilson Fellowship.   

Wolanin, a native of Detroit, Michigan, received his B.A. magna cum laude from Oberlin College and an M.A. and Ph.D. in Government from Harvard University.

Erin B. Renner joined the Advisory Committee as an assistant director in June 2005. She previously worked as the assistant to the chief of staff for Senator Joseph R. Biden, Jr.  Ms. Renner received her Ed.M from Harvard Graduate School of Education in 2005 and her B.A. in political science and communication from the University of Massachusetts Amherst in 2002.