Kansas foster care offers new placement options

The Kansas foster care system is working towards a brighter future with new placement options. Under the SOUL Family option, kids 16 and over can choose a trusted adult, regardless of blood relation, to raise them into adulthood instead of bouncing from home to home waiting to be adopted or to age out of the system.

September 13, 2024 - 2:09 PM

Nykia Gatson, a former foster child, is helping to inform Kansas’ first-in-the-nation permanency option that allows youth in foster care who are 16 years or older to choose a trusted adult, regardless of blood relation, to guide them into adulthood. Photo by Sherman Smith/Kansas Reflector

TOPEKA — As Kansas officials, foster care service providers and advocates work to improve a system with a checkered past, new initiatives bring optimism for kids who have historically been left behind.

The fewest number of children entered the state’s foster care system in 2023 since 2006, according to data from the Kansas Department for Children and Families. But older and disabled youths in the system have been left without a permanent place to live at a higher rate than their peers. The state and foster care service providers are seeking to remedy the disparity in several…

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