Supporting LA's foster youth by creating a dependable community built on trust and consistency.

College matriculation rates

District-wide graduation rates

Proficiency in English and Language Arts and Math

Student education pipeline

Suspension and expulsion rates

Truancy rates in elementary and middle schools

Central LA

South LA

County of Los Angeles

LAUSD

South & Central LA have largest population of FY

TAP will make LA the best place to learn by supporting foster youth so they have the foundation needed to succeed in and graduate from high school, college & career ready. Many foster youth fail during middle school and without support, dropout of high school. Some don’t make it to high school at all. TAP will provide intensive support to our youth through middle school with summer and afterschool programs, so they are ‘high school ready’, performing at or above grade level, while being emotionally & behaviourally prepared when matriculating into high school.

The Academy will pilot its afterschool program, The Co-Op in April of 2017, before launching full time in September of 2017, building on the continuing success of our summer program, Camp Xavier, extending its reach and effect. Camp Xavier is a 2 week summer program held the last two weeks of July, focused on building trust & community within a day camp & sleep away camp. It will be followed by The Co-Op, an exclusive after school program for the same 20 foster youth, providing enrichment, remediation, & a safe place to belong. Supports will continue to be available to our members throughout high school. By maintaining connected services, we will support the Student Education Pipeline, following the youth from middle to high school and beyond.

Research has shown that keeping school as the point of stability in a foster youth’s life, is essential in lowering dropout rates & increasing proficiency & interest in academics. Unfortunately, foster youth attend an average of 7-10 schools & can change placements 20+ times. With the systems set up as silos, it is nearly impossible to guarantee a foster youth continued enrollment in school. As we work to change this, TAP has taken another approach. TAP members are guaranteed a continuous, tuition free placement within The Academy Project, regardless of placement changes, through to the completion of high school. Because of the support & security TAP offers, youth can look forward to going to school and are freed to invest in their education, lowering truancy rates.

Although this is a difficult promise to keep, we will do whatever it takes to keep our youth engaged with the group they belong to. We will work with the school & foster placements as soon as an issue arises so we can prevent placement changes in the first place. There will also be events & field trips throughout the year where transportation is provided to all of our youth, regardless of distance of placement. By increasing academic proficiency & making high school graduation a reality for our most vulnerable population, suspension, expulsion and dropout rates will decrease and graduation & college matriculation rates will rise. The Academy Project will provide the necessary support & motivation to give our youth the chance to own their own narratives & future successes.

TAP aims to improve outcomes for both the individual foster youth and the foster youth community. Although that can take many different forms, we will evaluate and monitor our progress by tracking the following metrics:

Individual:

Number of youth participating in TAP

Number of youth applying to TAP

Daily Attendance

Baseline metrics established via evaluations (academic, physical, mental) given upon joining The Co-Op and monitored throughout

Academic proficiency and general well being

We will conduct monthly review interviews and survey our youth and staff before, during and after selected milestones to measure satisfaction with program. As an example: With the guidance of The Department of Social Welfare at UCLA we evaluated the success of Camp Xavier 2016 with surveys given to campers on the first & last day of day camp & the last day of sleep-away camp.

Community: Several studies (The Invisible Achievement Gap) have provided baseline metrics for LA’s foster youth. TAP will work with Partner Schools to establish & track key performance indicators like:

Student attendance

Transfer rates to alternative schools

Suspension & expulsion rates

CST scores and participation

Drop-out rates

High school graduation rates

College attendance rates

We intend to continue to work with UCLA to create and execute a thorough and detailed evaluation of TAP. We intend to continue to track life outcomes ( housing, addiction, employment) as our youth leave the system

Money

Volunteers

Advisors/board members

Publicity/awareness

Infrastructure (building/space/vehicles etc.)

Network/relationship support