Federal Law Guidance

The Every Student Succeeds Act focuses on maintaining educational stability for vulnerable students, including those in foster care. Children in foster care encounter numerous educational challenges, such as trauma, high mobility, and undiagnosed behavioral and health issues. ESSA mandates guidelines and resources to improve educational outcomes for foster children. These provisions became effective on December 10, 2016.

Identification of Youth in Foster Care

The Bureau of Indian Education mandates prompt identification of students in foster care. Local education and child welfare agencies must work both independently and collaboratively to ensure that children in foster care receive the educational benefits outlined in the Fostering Connection to Success and Increasing Adoptions Act of 2008.

The LEA/School, CWA, and Tribal CWA must collaborate closely to implement the Title I educational stability provisions. (ESEA section 1111©(5)). They should jointly decide what documentation or records need to be shared, establish criteria for decision-making, and set up a structure, such as regular meetings, where relevant individuals can participate in the process.

A child climbs on a jungle gym.
  • The school Notification of Placement Form is filled out by the child welfare custodial agency responsible for representing all students in foster care.
  • The LEA/School foster care liaison ensures custodial agencies immediately provide the LEA with their point of contact and receive the foster care student’s demographic information.
  • Custodial agencies must provide the LEA/School with their point of contact and obtain the student’s demographic information. LEA/School liaisons can access the student demographic details from the register office.
  • LEAs must have a process in place for custodial agencies to collect demographic information during the summer months.
  • Custodial agencies should include the district liaison in the child’s family meeting.
  • LEA/School liaison should invite the custodial agency to the child’s individualized plan meetings.
  • All meetings and correspondence between custodial agencies and LEA/School liaisons should be documented and attached to the student’s file.

Placement Information

  • Purpose: Initial & Annual Change
  • Placement Date
  • Student Placement: Foster Family or Relative
  • Residency Determination: Resident or Nonresident or Termination
  • Notifications: Agency & Educational & Financial
  • LEA/School Liaisons: Ensure the youth has been identified/enrolled in NASIS. The foster care tab should be checked in NASIS.

Notification to the school facilitates collaboration, oversight, and case planning by the School foster care liaison in partnership with the foster care case manager from the agency (county, tribe, or state).

Transportation Guide for Students in Foster Care under ESSA

The Every Students Succeeds Act (ESSA) of 2015 requires districts to work closely with Child Welfare Agencies (CWAs) to customize transportation processes and procedures to fit their specific local contexts. Local Education Agencies (LEAs) and CWAs must collaboratively develop procedures that enable immediate transportation needed to maintain educational stability for students in foster care.

Under ESSA, transportation procedures for children in foster care must:

  • Ensure that children in foster care needing transportation to the school of origin will receive cost-effective transportation in accordance with the CWA’s authority to use child welfare funding for school of origin transportation.
  • Ensure that, if there are additional costs incurred in providing transportation to the school of origin, the LEA/School will provide transportation when the following negotiations take place:
    • The local CWA office agrees to reimburse the LEA/School for the cost of such transportation;
    • The LEA/School and local CWA agree to share the cost;
    • The LEA/School agrees to pay for the cost of such transportation;
    • The school of origin, local CWA, school of residence and/or placing CWA share costs.

Development of the transportation plan should include both LEAs/Schools and CWAs’ points of contact (POC). In the event of a transportation dispute, local transportation plans should include a dispute resolution process to address how the transportation requirement will be met if parties cannot come to an agreement. LEAs must ensure that a child in foster care remains in the school of origin while any disputes regarding transportation costs are being resolved. ESEA 1111(g)(1)(E)(i) and 1112©(5)(B)(i)

Contact

Casey Sovo (Comanche & St. Regis Mohawk)
Supervisory Education Program Specialist - Supplemental Education Programs
Division of Performance & Accountability
casey.sovo@bie.edu

Resources

Forms and Templates