Aging Out Of Foster Care-Utah Youth Summit

This article discusses the 10th Annual Utah Youth Summit: Utah foster kids learn how to live after ‘aging out’ [The Salt Lake Tribune 8/2/12 by Lindsay Whitehurst]

“For two days, about 200 foster kids age 14 and older gathered at the University of Utah to learn how to live on their own, including how to set goals and reach them, resolve conflicts responsibly and find and keep housing.

Many of the teenagers have led lives in flux, bouncing from place to place with unstable families and moving frequently again after they enter the system, leaving them without a network of trusted people to help them through rough spots.

“The number-one indicator of whether youth will be successful is if they have permanent relationships,” Larson said. Helping create and cement those relationships, she said, is perhaps the most important goal of the summit, which started Wednesday and ended Thursday with foster kids telling the group what they thought about the system.

They asked for privacy from new foster parents who might go through journals or Facebook accounts, changes to agency rules that require a background check from every guest if a foster child wants to go to a sleepover, opportunities to earn money for college and cooking lessons.

“Just being able to have their voices heard, that’s huge,” Larson said. In the audience were DCFS top brass, as well as people who found success after foster care and teenage homelessness: former Washington professional baseball player Dashawn Patrick and Franklin Covey executive Sam Bracken.”

This article shares more stories: Summit aids foster children’s transition to adult living [Deseret News 8/5/12 by Marjorie Cortez], In addition to foster children interacting together, there were breakout sessions with topics such as”goal setting, accountability and conflict resolution.”

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