The Fund for State Children and Youth Policy
In 2023, the Annie E. Casey Foundation launched a fund to support policy changes in states to improve outcomes for young people ages birth through age 24. While there are a broad range of policy challenges and issues that impact the lives of young people, in 2024 the fund is seeking to support policies in three specific domains:
- Basic needs – This area focuses on state policies that promote access to health and mental health care, nutrition and food security, housing stability, and ensuring that children, youth, and emerging adults have and maintain permanency within a family system and are free of harmful government intervention, such as involvement in the child welfare system and in the juvenile justice system.
- Income and work supports – This area focuses on state policies that support access to paid and family medical leave and paid sick leave, access to quality, affordable child care, and the creation, expansion, and modernization of state Earned Income Tax Credits (EITCs) and Child Tax Credits (CTCs).
- Post-secondary education – This area focuses on state policies that address barriers to accessing and completing college and/or trade schools.
The fund is especially interested in work that addresses the needs of young people facing the most significant obstacles, including:
- Young people of color in low-income families,
- Young people living in concentrated poverty,
- Young people currently or formerly in foster care,
- Young people affected by the justice system, and
- Young people in immigrant families.