BACKGROUND
By every educational achievement measure, Arizona’s children in foster care place near last among other at-risk student groups –including those experiencing homelessness, those in poverty, and those who speak English only as a second language. The collective adversities facing children in foster care are distinct from other at-risk populations. Many foster children change schools – sometimes multiple times a year – and lose or never even receive educational services and resources they so desperately need to address traumas.
These findings are thoroughly documented in the groundbreaking report Arizona’s Invisible Achievement Gap: Education Outcomes of Students in Foster Care in the State’s Public Schools and align with statistics on educational barriers to students in foster care around the United States. This review builds on those findings and recommends four steps Arizona lawmakers can take to meet the unique educational needs of children experiencing foster care.
A consistent, quality education is a key to lifelong success – and Arizona’s current laws fail to protect the right to a basic education for many who need it most. But this can be fixed.