CPYP | News & Events

NEWS AND EVENTS

February 1, 2010

CPYP Merging with Seneca Center
CPYP has completed its funding cycle and is in its final days. CPYP's office in Oakland will be closing January 29, 2010. On February 1, 2010, CPYP will merge with the Seneca Center for Family Finding and Youth Connectedness, and Robert Friend will begin as director of the Center. The Stuart Foundation has generously provided resources to the Center to support the provision of training and technical assistance to California counties over the next three years to promote family finding and achievement of permanency.

Currently the Seneca Center for Family Finding and Youth Connectedness supports Kevin Campbell as he travels the country to train public and private child welfare agencies to conduct family finding and promote permanency. Bob Friend's primary tasks upon joining the Center will be to:

Continue the support for Kevin Campbell and help the Center build capacity to increase the amount of training on family finding and permanency nationally
Meet the objectives of the Stuart grant to assist 20-30 California county child welfare sites and one site in Washington state to improve their permanency practice, policy, and procedure
Develop a model that allows the Center to sustain the provision of training and technical assistance beyond the grant cycle
Rebrand (and eventually rename) the Center to reflect the ongoing development of family finding and the work of the California Permanency for Youth Project.

So, there will be ongoing support, advocacy, and development of work to promote permanency for foster youth both in California and across the country. Certainly opportunities will be created that overlap and leverage the California and national work. Under the leadership of Friend, Center staff intend to develop curricula and training materials to further family finding and permanency work.

A message from CPYP Director Robert Friend:
"While CPYP has historically focused on older youth in the back end of the system to attain permanency, we all recognize that while we need to further this work to help more youth who continue to languish in foster care without permanency, we also need to change the conditions of the system to prevent this condition from continuing. As such, our new efforts will also include a sub-focus on the development of a learning environment for county sites that are engaging or embracing front end permanency work to keep families together, and to promote families to remain connected to youth who need the protection and support of the child welfare system. I have encountered a number of sites that have begun to change the culture of belief in their departments to embrace, value, and expect permanency as a primary product of their work efforts, and are now extending these efforts to the front end. We are very excited to include this newer focus as part of the development of permanency work that will further the systems change necessary to achieve CPYP's vision that no youth exit the foster care system without a permanent connection to a caring adult. Once I have settled into the new site and we have developed sufficient clarity of vision and purpose of the Center, we will conduct our outreach to gauge readiness and interest in participating in a learning community to support this front end permanency work."

New Contact Information:
Bob Friend, Director
CPYP/Seneca Center for Family Finding and Youth Connectedness
15942 Foothill Blvd.
San Leandro, CA 94578
Tel: 510.317.1446
Fax: 510.317.1451
Email: bob_friend@senecacenter.org

September 8, 2009

Left to Themselves: Foster Youths in L.A., a Before-and-After Story
Freelance writer Daniel Heimpel gives a moving account about the struggles of John, an emancipated foster youth, in a story for LA Weekly.

Read the story

Heimpel also wrote about the Fostering Connections to Success Act in his article "The Fight to Make Well-Being a Foster Child's Right," in the Huffington Post, September 16, 2009.

July 2009

JUST RELEASED: Updates to Alameda County "Guide to Permanency Options for Youth"
Published in 2005, the original guide provided concise information about various permanency options, including reunification, adoption, and legal guardianship. These updates include a revised comparison chart which shows the differences in financial benefits and legal and psychosocial factors among the various permanency options, as well as three supplemental handouts.

A Guide to Permanency Options for Youth

Spring 2009

Blue Ribbon Commission releases Final Report and Action Plan
The California Blue Ribbon Commission on Children in Foster Care (BRC) has released its final report and action plan. The Commission was founded in March 2006; its charge was to develop recommendations to improve outcomes related to safety, permanency, well-being, and fairness for children in foster care. Final recommendations of the Commission focus on four areas: 1) efforts to prevent removal and achieve permanency; 2) court reforms; 3) collaboration between the courts and their child welfare partners; and 4) resources and funding. The Commission is now working on implementation of these recommendations.

Commission on Children in Foster Care (BRC) Final Report

Spring 2009

Latest issue of CW360° focuses on older youth
Child Welfare 360° (CW360°) is an annual publication from the Center for Advanced Studies in Child Welfare, University of Minnesota School of Social Work, that provides comprehensive information on the latest research in child welfare. The Spring 2009 issue is entitled "Permanency or Aging Out: Adolescents in the Child Welfare System." It is full of articles from noted projects and authors including Mark Courtney, Madelyn Freundlich, Lauren Frey, and CPYP director Robert Friend.

CW360° website

June 2, 2009

Bay Area Heart Gallery
Bay Area Heart Gallery now on exhibit through end of August The Bay Area Heart Gallery is a stunning professional photography exhibit consisting of photographs of children and youth living in foster care in need of adoptive families and permanent lifelong relationships. The Heart Gallery also features portraits of adoptive families and their children. These families reflect the diversity of adoptive families across the Bay Area. The Heart Gallery is once again on exhibit at these locations and dates:

June 3-30, 2009 - San Francisco City Hall, San Francisco, CA
July -7-30, 2009 - Berkeley Public Library, Central Branch, Berkeley, CA
August 3-28, 2009 - Alameda County Library, Dublin Branch, Dublin CA

For more details, visit the Gallery's website.

May 3, 2009

Teen Fights To Find His Own Foster Family
Although he's an exceptional student with a near perfect SAT score, 17-year-old Alex Chivescu needed to find a foster family who would be willing to accept him into their home. Alex became his own advocate in his search to find a family.

See the CBSNEWS story about Alex

February 26-27, 2009

CPYP Annual Conference
As in previous years, the CPYP Annual Conference was held at the Waterfront Hotel, Oakland, CA. The focus of the conference was how to leverage what we have already learned. Barry Chaffkin, CEO and co-founder of CT Wocat (Changing the World One Child at a Time), was the keynote speaker. A second keynote session featured Pat Reynolds-Harris, founding director of CPYP, and Jennifer Rodriguez, a former foster youth. Other workshop sessions included Sibling Issues; Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender, and Questioning (LGBTQ) Youth; Grief and Loss; and Using GenoPro (genogram software).

View conference pictures

October 7, 2008

Fostering Connections Act signed into law by President Bush
H.R. 6892, the Fostering Connections to Success and Increasing Adoptions Act of 2008 amends parts of the Foster Care and Adoption Assistance Program of the Social Security Act. Specifically, this new legislation amends parts B and E of Title IV of the Social Security Act to connect and support relative caregivers, improve outcomes for children in foster care, provide for tribal foster care and adoption access, improve incentives for adoption, and for other purposes.