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Cuyahoga County Transitional Youth Project Grows

Voices for Ohio’s Children has partnered with the Alliance of Child Caring Service Providers and the Mental Health Advocacy Coalition during early 2007 to develop a community-wide advisory group that can identify the pressing issues facing youth who are transitioning from foster care to independence, inventory the existing services and programs in the community, identify the most promising opportunities and strategies for improving supports for transitional youth and create an action plan for appropriate next steps.

Based on three workgroup meetings and one youth focus group, the group has identified needs in these areas:

Networking and Communications
Information and Resources
Direct Service Programs
System Change and Policy Issues

To continue the Transitional Youth Project work, the project has been divided into two sub-committees for further development and implementation: Youth Space and Policy & System Change.

The idea of the Youth Space will generate opportunities in which youth can network, communicate and access information, programs and services. Nicole DeBose of Family and Children First Council continues to facilitate committee meetings to research and develop a model to be presented to the community in February 2008. The next Youth Space committee meeting will be held on Wednesday, November 28, at 3:00p.m. Beyond Identities. For more information, please contact Nicole at ndebose@cuyahogacounty.us.

Voices for Ohio’s Children and the Mental Health Advocacy Coalition will formally host the Policy and System Change committee by moving the process for policy change forward. Executive Directors, Amy Swanson and Joan Englund will engage a group to determine the appropriate strategies for initiating system and policy change. Participants will consider how they might help in formulating the agenda for change as well as a dissemination plan for how to build the political will to make these changes happen. The next meeting for the Policy and System Change will be held on Thursday, January 10, 2008, at 10:00a.m. at the Center for Families and Children. For more information, please contact Yvonne C. Hunnicutt at yhunnicutt@vfc-oh.org.