Every year, roughly 15,000 young people "age out" of the foster care system, according to the National Council for Adoption. While these young adults are given their legal independence, we have consistently failed to provide the durable social infrastructure required to thrive. After being in a system built almost entirely around temporary placements rather than reliable connections, the question of what happens after "emancipation" has become impossible to ignore.
For decades, the child welfare system has operated under a flawed premise: that eligibility for resources is the same thing as a safety net. It is not. A young adult can qualify for a housing voucher and still struggle to find a landlord who will accept it. They can receive tuition assistance but drop out because they lack someone to call when financial aid forms become confusing. They can get a job interview but lack the mentor to help turn that opportunity into a career. When we prioritize administrative placement over lifelong belonging, we force youth into a permanent state of survival mode.
True stability cannot be simulated by forced self-sufficiency. The burden of navigating our fragmented social safety net falls heavily on those with the least time, money, and institutional knowledge. Young people are forced to endure the "resource runaround," moving between siloed agencies that each address one isolated symptom of a much larger problem.
Commitment To Resources
The solution is a commitment to responsive resources and reliable relationships, delivered not by transactional systems but by empowering communities.
Over the past 25 years working alongside young people transitioning from foster care, I have learned that closing the gap between our current practices and our professed purpose requires a fundamental reconsideration of how people thrive. We must treat community as essential infrastructure, not an optional add-on, by adapting an old proverb with new wisdom:
"Give a man a fish, and you feed him for a day. Teach a man to fish, and you feed him for a lifetime. But make him part of a fishing village, and he’s able to thrive even if he’s not able to fish some days."
We need to build "fishing villages." Young adults certainly need practical assistance, but more importantly, they need a community capable of staying engaged as their circumstances change. Trusted supporters can walk alongside young people as they navigate decisions, rather than simply moving them to the next stage of a program. Support must be rooted in lasting relationships, not transactional directives.
Technology Needs To Connect
Technology must connect, not isolate. Digital tools are increasingly popular in social services to reduce administrative friction. But a portal that simply produces another static list of agencies just digitizes fragmentation. Technology should make it easier for young people to reach the human support behind the resources. The goal should be to create digital access points that unify services, strengthen collaboration, and help communities connect rather than compete.
Expertise lives in experience. All services and the ways they are delivered should be designed with input from the people who have navigated foster care. We know that the expertise needed to create solutions is not exclusive to professionals who administer the system. True leadership means ensuring solutions are designed by the lived experts closest to the challenges we are striving to address.
We must rethink nonprofit collaboration. The challenge before us is a structural mindset shift. We must move beyond creating isolated programs and siloed organizations that deliver transactional services with short-term outputs and outcomes. Instead, we must become true partners with the communities we serve, recognizing the relational power they possess alongside a collective ecosystem of resources.
By prioritizing community, connection, collaboration, and the collective wisdom of those we serve, we can finally move beyond systemic silos, employ technology that fosters human connection, and combine our resources in ways that ensure every young person has what they need for an empowered, satisfying life.
Don Wells is co-chief empowerment officer of Just in Time for Foster Youth, a San Diego nonprofit supporting young adults transitioning from foster care. All views expressed are the author’s own.