A New Federal Approach to Working With Homeless Youth
One of the objectives of the United States Interagency Council on Homelessness is to end youth homelessness by 2020. Here at NCFY, we want to help you understand how USICH aims to do that, in collaboration with federal, state and local government, and of course with programs that work directly with homeless young people.
A big step forward came in September when USICH unveiled a new “intervention model” for working with homeless youth who are on their own, apart from their families. Part of the 2012 amendment (PDF,2.17MB) to the Opening Doors strategic plan to end homelessness, the model is meant to harness what we know about homeless youth from research. What makes them more or less likely to succeed in school and life or to have problems? The model will enable youth workers to build “protective factors,” reduce “risk factors” and get young people these four important things:
- Stable housing
- Permanent connections with friends, family, teachers and others
- Well-being
- Education and employment
The illustration below, from the Opening Doors amendment, takes you through the steps of using the model.
Here’s how we think NCFY fits in to making the model something you, as a youth worker, can actually use (each of these points fits with the corresponding step in the graphic):
- We’re updating our popular list of assessment and screening tools for measuring mental health, substance abuse, and independent living skills in adolescents.
- We’ll keep summarizing the latest research on risks and protective factors among runaway and homeless youth.
- We’ll be expanding our coverage of evidence-based interventions that runaway and homeless youth programs across the country are using.
- We’ll continue writing about FYSB’s four outcomes for runaway and homeless youth and how you can help youth achieve them.
Stay tuned!