Foster Skills tackles a pressing issue:
the unfortunate reality that today’s foster youth, without any fault of their own, bear the brunt of both individual failings and systemic inaction or ill-considered action—often a combination of both.
We firmly believe that the root cause of poor outcomes for foster youth lies in a deficit of systemic innovation. Disturbing statistics highlight this problem: 40% of former foster youth have repeated one or more grades, and by the age of 19, only 20-30% manage to graduate high school. Comparatively, 52% of them read below their expected grade level, whereas the overall population stands at 38%. Shockingly, 37% of former foster youth experience homelessness after reaching adulthood.
Foster Skills is dedicated to empowering foster youth to defy the odds by collaborating with state governments to bring innovation to their child welfare systems.
We address two crucial challenges:
- The poor outcomes faced by foster youth
- 2. The sluggish pace of government action that leads to an innovation deficit within the child welfare system, particularly where vulnerable children and families require immediate and tangible support. We firmly believe that resolving this innovation deficit through rapid prototyping and human-centered design methodologies can pave the way for foster youth, as well as countless other children and families, to flourish.
