ARTICLE TAG

Al Franken

Educational Stability for Foster Youth

8/3/2017

States All Over the Map on Ensuring Educational Stability for Foster Youth

The Every Student Succeeds Act gave school systems across the country until December 2016 to  transport foster youth to school. Nine months later, implementation is wanting. For the roughly 270,000 school-aged children living in America’s foster care system, educational success can be elusive.

4/28/2017

Providers Hope Trauma Legislation Will Help Native Children in Foster Care

Recent federal legislation put forward by senators Sens. Dick Durbin (D-IL), Al Franken (D-MN) and Heidi Heitkamp (D-ND) proposes to address the issue of childhood trauma through the creation of a federal trauma task force.

2/23/2017

Missing the Bus

California fails to implement federal education law, denying students in foster care their right to school transportation. At least 35,000 school-aged California children live in foster care today. Entering the system is, invariably, traumatic.

6/6/2013

Federal Education Bill Steps Up for Foster Youth

Foster Youth Written into Elementary and Secondary Education Reform (ESEA) bill. An initial overture this year to overhaul the Elementary and Secondary Education Act would require schools to work with child welfare systems to ensure educational stability for foster youths.

8/14/2012

Sen. Mary Landrieu Talks Foster Care, Education and a Growing Movement

On August 2nd, Sens. Mary Landrieu (D-La.), Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa), Mark Begich (D-Ala.), Roy Blunt (R-Mo.), Barbara Boxer (D-Calif.), Al Franken (D-Minn.), Amy Klobuchar (D-Minn.) introduced  the Uninterrupted Scholars Act. The bill would amend education policy that currently precludes many adults and institutions from access to an individual student’s records.

8/7/2012

Post-Partisan: the Power of Foster Care Politics

While the nation bemoans a “gridlocked” Congress and Comedy Central’s Messrs. Stewart and Colbert aptly ridicule both Presidential candidates for a disregard of specificity on one hand and hubris on the other, I have borne witness to a very different vision of our elected leadership.

    8/2/2012

    Senate Takes up Charge on Foster Youth School Records

    WASHINGTON D.C. –  Down on Capitol Hill, the air is hot, wet and gummy. With recess around the corner and the political parties settling in for a bitter election cycle, few bills of substance are moving or being introduced, save a seemingly small tweak to privacy laws that promises to dramatically change the educational cards for students experiencing foster care.