Background/Purpose of Request:
Children in foster care are often a vulnerable and highly mobile student population. More than half of the children in foster care in North Carolina are in elementary or secondary schools. Children in foster care experience much higher levels of residential and school instability than their peers and experience significantly more unscheduled school placement changes and are much more likely than their peers to struggle academically and to fall behind in school.
Fostering Connections, the first federal law addressing the importance of educational stability for children in foster care requires Child Welfare Agencies (CWAs) to create a plan for ensuring the educational stability of each child while in foster care. The CWA must make assurances that the child’s foster care placement takes into account the appropriateness of the current educational setting and the proximity of that placement to the school of origin.
Fostering Connections further requires CWAs to coordinate with local educational agencies (LEAs) to ensure that a child in foster care remains in his or her school of origin unless it is not in the child’s best interest to do so.
If remaining in the school of origin is not in the child’s best interest, Fostering Connections provides that the child be immediately enrolled in a new school and records be promptly transferred to the new school.
ESSA reauthorized the 1965 Elementary and Secondary Education Act (ESEA) and includes new provisions that promote educational stability for children in foster care. These provisions, which took effect on December 10, 2016, complement those in Fostering Connections and require state educational agencies (SEAs) and LEAs to work with CWAs to ensure the educational stability of children in foster care. ESSA does not create new legal requirements for child welfare agencies; rather it mirrors and enhances the responsibilities of CWAs under Fostering Connections and creates joint agency responsibility and continuous collaboration.
ESSA requires SEAs to include in their state plans the steps that the agencies will take to ensure school stability for children in foster care, including assurances that children enroll or remain in their school of origin unless a determination is made that it is not in their best interest. That determination must be based on all factors relating to the child’s best interest including consideration of the appropriateness of the current educational setting and the proximity to the school in which the child is enrolled at the time of the foster care placement.
Under ESSA, state education plans must now include the steps the state will take to ensure that when a school change is warranted, a child in foster care can enroll immediately in a new school even if the child cannot produce normally required enrollment documents and school records. Additionally, enrolling schools must immediately contact the school last attended by the child to obtain relevant academic and other education records. LEAs and CWAs must collaborate and under ESSA, LEAs must include in their local plans assurances that they have developed and implemented clear written procedures governing how transportation to ensure school stability will be provided, arranged, and funded for the duration of the child’s time in foster care in a cost-effective way.
The plan developed by the Brunswick County Department of Social Services and Brunswick County Schools is attached for review and approval. Staff recommends approval of the ESSA agreement. |