Allow foster youth to proactively manage their growth into adulthood

On this page

About this recommendation

Allow foster youth to manage their growth into adulthood directly, enabling them to define their goals and collaborate with their support team to achieve them. Accomplish this by replacing traditional paper-based milestone planning with a web app.

How to do this

  • Work with a small team to prototype and pilot this web app.
  • Focus on 1-2 goal areas of particular need and interest to youth
  • Consider partnering with other states and organizations to reduce costs and work at scale.
  • Invest in maintaining and running this service.
  • Flexible goal-setting, allowing youth to adapt goals suggested by the state, or set their own goals (for example, “Get my driver’s license by Xth birthday”).
  • Suggested steps to accomplish each goal, helping youth break down big goals into a series of achievable steps (“Get a copy of my birth certificate by MM/DD/YYYY”; “Pass two written practice driver’s tests by MM/DD/YYYY”). In its Aged Out report, national nonprofit Think of Us found that youth need help practicing breaking down big goals into smaller steps. This feature allows the youth to do just that.
  • Links to related resources, to help youth know how to access programs and other forms of assistance in achieving individual steps (such as a list of local driving instruction schools and links to practice written tests). This feature will also be used to point youth to state resources.
  • Progress tracking, with reminders, nudges, and digital achievement badges to motivate continued youth engagement.
  • Lightweight dashboard for state human services depts and supportive adults, to notify caseworkers when their inaction is delaying goal achievement or to prompt supportive adults to track goals and proactively. We heard that a youth’s progress is often blocked because they are waiting for an action to be taken by their caseworker or a supportive adult. This feature will encourage and nudge the caseworker or supportive adult to take the necessary action to support the youth.
  • User authentication and authorization, so that users can save their data and keep it secure. This feature is necessary for the privacy and security of our users’ data.

Anticipated costs and benefits

Costs

Benefits

  • We estimate that a successful pilot would cost about $350,000. This estimate represents the cost of developing the app and running the pilot.
  • Your state or organization may also be able to apply for additional funds from the John H. Chafee Foster Care Independence Program. There are philanthropic entities, such as The Annie E. Casey Foundation, that are interested in supporting aging-out foster youth.
  • Help youth follow up with their caseworker and supportive adults to take actions when necessary.
  • Increase visibility for human services and supportive adults on the progress that youth are making toward their goals.
  • Transform the caseworker-driven transition plan processes into a youth-driven effort.
  • Youth can keep important goals and supportive resources in a persistent digital format they can access from their personal mobile device, school or library web browsers, etc.

Who's doing this

1 of 54 states and territories have implemented this recommendation.

For more information on proposed solution:

  • App Design Concept: Illustrates high-level examples of Glow Up's functionality.
  • Pilot Proposal: Provides more details of the set of pilot app features and how to measure the success of the pilot.
  • Technical Considerations: Provides recommendations for how to keep the application architecture simple while ensuring security for and granting privacy to the youth.