When the CR was passed last Thursday, it did not extend pandemic relief funding for youth exiting foster care including additional $400 million in Chafee-pandemic relief funding (annual mandatory Chaffee funds are set at $143 million). The addition $400 million expired at the end of fiscal year 2021. It is not clear how much of
November is national adoption month. This year’s theme is “Every Conversation Matters”, which means engaging youth in permanency plans through open conversations about adoption. As Adoption Month approaches, the Children’s Bureau kickstarted the conversation by hosting the webinar Every Conversation Matters featuring two young women with lived experience and an adoption supervisor. The first young
On September 28, 2021, First Focus on Children and the U.S. Child Poverty Action Group held a webinar to examine what the new US Census Bureau data tells us about the impact of COVID-19 on child poverty, and the importance of action from Congress. There are two different ways the Census Bureau measures poverty in
On Tuesday, September 28, 2021, the National Child Welfare Workforce Institute (NCWWI) and the Child Welfare League of America (CWLA) presented a panel to discuss Empowering the Child Welfare Workforce and its Emerging Leaders. The webinar provided information about CWLA’s Emerging Leaders Committee and insightful steps, tips, and strategies to promote growth and development of
On September 18, the Concord Monitor published a story about the child welfare workforce that is probably too typical of several state and local child welfare workforce situations. The workforce is vital to any successful changes, improvements, or reforms in prevention, reducing the number of separated families, and helping children and youth reach a permanent
September 15th marks the first day of National Hispanic Heritage Month! Hispanic Heritage Month began as a mere week in 1968 when Congressman George E. Brown of East Los Angeles, California, proposed the celebration to honor the cultural impact Latinos had on America. After being passed by Congress in September of 1968, President Lyndon B. Johnson
The Office of the Assistant Secretary for Planning and Evaluation (ASPE) released a new report, Foster Care Entry Rates Grew Faster for Infants than for Children of Other Ages, 2011-2018, that found that infants accounted for more than 70 percent of the total increase in foster care entries in recent years at the national, state, and
Last week the House Ways and Means Committee released and then worked on perhaps the biggest parts of reconciliation and the Biden Administration’s “Build Back Better” agenda when they published the tax provisions. The tax pieces can be divided into two broad parts, tax deductions and incentives and tax increases to pay for the tax
On Wednesday, 15, 2021, over 400 prominent economists outlined their strong support for a permanent extension of the CTC. In part they said: “Childhood poverty is a staggering problem in the United States, affecting approximately one in seven children, and one in five children of color, even before the Covid-19 pandemic began. Children growing up in
Last Wednesday, September 15, 2021, the United States Department of Treasury released a study on the significance of child care to the U.S. economy and to families. The report, The Economics of Child Care Supply in the United States, indicated that for an average family with at least one child under age 5, approximately 13 percent