(2006). Children and Youth Services Review, Vol. 28, 1459-1481.

The study in this research piece evaluated the adult education, employment and financial successes (or failures) of 659 adults (20 to 33 years of age) who had gone through intermediate and long-term foster care stays in their youth. These kinds of studies are important for present and future agencies because a fuller understanding of shortcomings -- and strengths -- in policy and judgment can lead to better care and more productive lives for alumni of foster care. When visited and surveyed, many of the 659 individuals (alumni) had completed high school not in formal education but via a GED; hence one-third of the 659 had incomes at or below the poverty level and "more than one in five" had been homeless following foster care (Pecora, et al., 2006, p. 1459). The Northwest Foster Care Alumni Study investigated the lives of alumni...
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