How Adolescents Who Discontinued Child Welfare Services After Exiting Foster Care Became Homeless

PI: Ronald G. Thompson, Jr., Ph.D.
School of Social Work
Columbia University

HOW ADOLESCENTS WHO DISCONTINUED CHILD WELFARE SERVICES AFTER EXITING FOSTER CARE BECAME HOMELESS

Although research to date provides a modicum of support for the association between foster care involvement and subsequent vulnerability to housing instability and homelessness, it does not provide insight into the nature of and transactions involved with this association, specifically among adolescents who discontinue child welfare services after exiting foster care. Guided by an ecological framework, this study proposes to conduct in-depth narrative interviews with 25 adolescents (age 15 to 21 years) who exited foster care in the past two years, discontinued child welfare services after exiting care, and sought public shelter at Covenant House New York for the first time. Housing instability and homelessness experiences since exiting care, associated emotional, behavioral, social, and contextual risks during that time period, types of services from which they would have benefited receiving, and critical times at which they would have benefited from such services will be explored.