MEDIA RELEASE

For Immediate Release: September 20, 2010

Fostering Media Connections

Contact: Daniel Heimpel

T: (510) 334-8636 dheimpel@fosteringmediaconnections.org

Back to School, Back to Instability
Leaders Unite to Demand Equal Educational Opportunities
and Outcomes for Foster Youth

As American children don their backpacks at the start of a new school year, foster youth, Members of Congress, advocates, and new research point to the desperate need to level the educational playing field for foster children, who persistently score lower than their peers in major educational measures.

New data being released on Sept. 23, shows that California foster youth in high
school are less likely to achieve proficiency on standardized math and English tests. In the four counties studied in the first phase of what will be unprecedented
statewide research, 11th grade foster students were 56 percent less likely to achieve proficiency in math compared to students closely matched on key achievement gap factors. Further, six percent of foster students were proficient compared to 18 percent of children in the general population. In comparison to matched students, 11th grade foster students were 26 percent less likely to score proficient or above in English. Overall, compared to approximately 36 percent of students in the general population, only 21 percent of foster youth were proficient in English.

The Congressional Coalition on Adoption Institute and Fostering Media Connections will release the data at a press conference on Thursday, September 23rd from 12:00 - 1:30 PM in Washington, C at the U.S. Capitol Visitors Center, Room SVC 215.

Click here to see a CSPAN interview with Daniel Heimpel about youth aging out of foster care.