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- Federal Resources
Federal Resources
Children's Bureau
The Children's Bureau (CB) is one of two bureaus within the Administration on Children, Youth and Families, Administration for Children and Families, of the Department of Health and Human Services. The Children's Bureau seeks to improve the safety, permanency and well-being of children through leadership, support for necessary services, and productive partnerships with states, tribes, and communities. It has the primary responsibility for administering federal programs that support state child welfare services.
Upcoming Event: November is National Adoption Month
This observance aims to increase national awareness of the need for permanent families for children and youth in the foster care system. This year’s theme, “We Never Outgrow the Need for Family—Just Ask Us,” reflects a focus on the importance of identifying permanent families for the thousands of 15- to 18-year-olds in foster care who are currently less likely to be adopted or who may age out of the system without a stable home. A new tip sheet, Talking with Older Youth About Adoption (PDF, 2 pages) provides child welfare professionals with a framework for how to talk with older youth about permanency and includes suggestions for how to make these conversations more effective.
Report: Child Maltreatment 2015
This report from the Child Welfare Information Gateway provides state-level data from the National Child Abuse and Neglect Data System on reports of abuse and neglect made to child protective services (CPS) agencies, the children involved, types of maltreatment, CPS responses, child and caregiver risk factors, services, and perpetrators.
Resource: Engaging Youth in Foster Care
This podcast shares the perspective of a youth formerly in foster care. It provides tips to caseworkers for engaging youth in developing their case plans and identifying supportive adults in their lives. This resource can help caseworkers as they work with youth who are in foster care or preparing to transition to adulthood.
Share with Youth: Being an Engaged and Involved Teen in Foster Care
This webpage provides information to teens in foster care about their permanency options, tools to help them transition to adulthood, and how to find support from other teens who have been in foster care.
Supporting Families Impacted by Incarceration — A Dialogue with Experts
This report, developed by the National Child Abuse and Neglect Technical Assistance and Strategic Dissemination Center, is the outcome of a meeting that convened national child welfare experts on families impacted by incarceration. It features key issues around this topic for practitioners and identifies needed resources and tools to support the workforce and families, along with a practical framework of intervention points from arrest to release.
John H. Chafee Foster Care Program for Successful Transition to Adulthood
The John H. Chafee Foster Care Program for Successful Transition to Adulthood (the Chafee program) provides funding to support youth/ young adults in or formerly in foster care in their transition to adulthood. The program is funded through formula grants awarded to child welfare agencies in States (including the District of Columbia, Puerto Rico and the U.S. Virgin Islands) and participating Tribes. Chafee funds are used to assist youth/ young adults in a wide variety of areas designed to support a successful transition to adulthood. Activities and programs include, but are not limited to, help with education, employment, financial management, housing, emotional support and assured connections to caring adults. Specific services and supports are determined by the child welfare agency, vary by State, locality and agency, and are often based on the individual needs of the young person. Many State or local agencies contract with private organizations to deliver services to young people.
College Preparation Checklist
This resource can help students of all ages to prepare academically and financially for education beyond high school (PDF, 28 pages). It provides an overview of options for financial aid for college, and checklists for students and parents to reference at each stage of a student’s education.
Share With Youth: Budgeting for College
ED’s Office of Federal Student Aid reminds students about the importance of budgeting to achieve future financial goals and prepare for unexpected bumps in the road.
Share with Youth: FAFSA Overview
The Office of Federal Student Aid at the Department of Education provides an overview of the Free Application for Federal Student Aid (FAFSA). The FAFSA takes about 30 minutes to complete, is free, and provides students access to grants, loans, and work-study funds from the federal government.
Share with Youth: Types of Federal Student Aid
The Office of Federal Student Aid offers more than $150 billion to students each year in the form of grants, loans, and work-study funds. While some colleges can also offer private student loans, federal loans often have lower fixed interest rates and other benefits.
Share with Youth: After the FAFSA — What Happens Next
This Office of Federal Student Aid video explains what happens after students complete and submit their FAFSA. The U.S. Department of Education will process the application and indicated colleges will be notified. Students will receive a Student Aid Report (SAR) and can check their student aid status online.
Resource: Program-Level Gainful Employment Earnings Data
This data set provides information on program-level outcomes of college students preparing for gainful employment that can be used by prospective students and their families to weigh their options. Overall, the data show graduates of career training programs at public institutions generally fare better than those of comparable programs at for-profit colleges, earning higher salaries and being more prepared to enter higher earning fields.
Report: National Student Loan FY 2014 Cohort Default Rate
These data describe the FY 2014 cohort student loan default rate, which increased slightly from 11.3% to 11.5% for students who entered repayment between fiscal years 2013 and 2014. During the tracking period, more than five million borrowers entered repayment and 580,671 of them defaulted on their loans.
Resource: Digital and Social Media Financial Aid Collateral
This website provides digital and social media resources to help teachers and counselors share important federal student aid information with students and parents. It features sample social media posts, messaging guidelines, blog posts, infographics, presentations, videos, and fact sheets on a variety of financial aid topics.
Military Youth on the Move
This site helps military youth cope with a deployment or move.
Campus Safety and Security Data Analysis Cutting Tool
Developed by the Department of Education, college applicants and their families can use this tool to access campus crime statistics for colleges and universities.
Federal TRIO Programs
The Federal TRIO Programs are educational opportunity outreach programs designed to motivate and support students from disadvantaged backgrounds. TRIO includes six outreach and support programs targeted to serve and assist low-income, first-generation college students, and students with disabilities to progress through the academic pipeline from middle school to post-baccalaureate programs.
Gaining Early Awareness and Readiness for Undergraduate Programs (GEAR UP)
This discretionary grant program is designed to increase the number of low-income students who are prepared to enter and succeed in postsecondary education.
Dear Colleague Letter: Unaccompanied Homeless Youth Determinations
ED released a Dear Colleague letter that clarifies determinations for unaccompanied homeless youth for financial aid (PDF, 4 pages). This information can help financial aid administrators better understand the definition of “homeless” and how to determine if students qualify as such.
Center for Effective Collaboration and Practice: Schools and Special Education
Resources on how to foster collaboration and implement best practices in school and special education settings.
Department of Education "Dear Colleague" Letter on Braille
The Department of Education released a Dear Colleague Letter to provide information to states and agencies about the importance of Braille instruction, clarify when these services should be provided to students, help school teams understand the evaluation required to guide decisions about services, and highlight available resources that can help personnel meet the needs of students who are blind or visually impaired (PDF, 6 pages).
Disability Employment 101
The Office of Special Education and Rehabilitative Services within the Department of Education has released and updated its Disability Employment 101 guide. This guide provides information about hiring employees with disabilities, including information about how to find qualified workers with disabilities, how to put disability and employment research into practice, and how to model what other businesses have done to successfully integrate individuals with disabilities into the workforce.
Early Warning, Timely Response: A Guide to Safe Schools
Early Warning, Timely Response: A Guide to Safe Schools offers research-based practices designed to assist school communities identify these warning signs early and develop prevention, intervention and crisis response plans.
Federal Resource Center for Special Education
The Federal Resource Center for Special Education supports the work of the six OSEP-funded Regional Resource Centers (RRCs) that provide technical assistance (TA) to assist states in complying with IDEA and to implement evidence-based educational practices.