Foster Care and Education Resources Available from the Center on Children and the Law

There are an increasing number of resources available that address the changes in education requirements for students in Foster Care made by the reauthorization of the Elementary and Secondary Education Act (ESEA) to the Every Student Succeeds Act (ESSA). At the 2018 annual conference hosted by the National Association for the Education of Homeless Children and Youth (NAEHCY), where for the past two years I have had the privilege of presenting, I focused my presentation on these changes.

I was fortunate to have Emily Peeler, JD, MSW, a staff lawyer with the Center on Children and the Law, in the audience at this presentation. She was not only helpful in answering a couple questions from the audience regarding issues not connected to ESSA, but she also provided me with a link to the Center on Children and the Law resources page for Educational Stability.

This site offers numerous resources including links to the Every Student Succeeds Act Implementation Toolkit: Improving Education Outcomes for Children and Youth in Foster Care and the Fostering Connections Implementation Toolkit. This toolkit relates to the major law addressing requirements for children and youth in foster care, or the Fostering Connections Act.

The Every Student Succeeds Act Implementation Toolkit: Improving Education Outcomes for Children and Youth in Foster Care includes sections on the following topics.

• A "Question and Answer" section on how ESSA will support students in foster care
• A discussion and overview of highlights of the federal guidance that was issued in June of 2016
• An implementation checklist that focuses on the role of specific agencies and stakeholders
• An implementation checklist that provides an outline for critical actions and tools that State and local agency leaders can use to support the implementation of the ESSA foster care provisions (The appendix on page 44 also includes links to other valuable resources)

The presentations from the 2018 NAEHCY conference, including the presentation that I gave, are available on the NAEHCY website. You must be a NAEHCY member to access the presentations, but membership is free. You can register for access by clicking the login link on the top right corner of the NAEHCY website.