Chapin Hall

Voices of Youth Count is a national Chapin Hall initiative to bring actionable evidence to prevent and end youth homelessness. From 2015 through 2017, Chapin Hall conducted the most comprehensive examination to date of youth homelessness, incorporating youth voices to develop achievable solutions. Since the Fall of 2017, Chapin Hall has published nine seminal reports on youth experiencing homelessness.

Voices of Youth Count examines:

• The size and characteristics of the runaway and homeless youth population
• The reasons youth become homeless
• The services and strategies they use to survive
• The roles of federal policies and programs in enabling communities and service providers to address their needs

The project’s initial report provided a national overview of youth homelessness in America. Since then, the project has released a series of reports that address different aspects of youth experiencing homelessness.

• The first report—Missed Opportunities: Youth Homelessness in America—revealed that one in 10 young adults between the ages of 18 and 25 and at least one in 30 adolescents between age ages of 13 and 17 experience some form of homelessness over the course of a year. (See the November 15, 2017 press release.)
• The project’s second brief, LGBTQ Youth Homelessness in America, found that LGBTQ youth experienced homelessness at more than twice the rate as their peers, and that they were more likely to experience adversities both before and during homelessness. (See April 25, 2018 press release.)
• The project’s third brief, Pregnant and Parenting Youth Experiencing Homelessness in America, estimates that as many as 1.1 million children have a young parent who experienced homelessness during the past year. (See May 10, 2018 press release.)
• The fourth report provides practical tips on conducting point-in-time youth homelessness counts, based on Chapin Hall’s experience conducting these counts in 22 representative communities across the United States. See Counting Youth Experiencing Homelessness in America.
• In the fifth brief, the project took an unprecedented look at rural youth experiencing homelessness.
• The sixth brief from the project shares a portion of the findings from in-depth interviews with homeless youth.
• In the seventh brief, researchers examine actions child welfare systems can take to ensure young people who have experienced foster care do not become homeless.
• The eighth brief presents the results of a systematic evidence review and summarizes evidence on the effectiveness of interventions to prevent youth homelessness, reduce its duration and effects, and promote sustainable improvements in youth well-being.
• The ninth brief from the project highlights opportunities for the education and youth homelessness systems to work together to ensure that youth are supported in their living situations, their educational experiences, and their career pursuits.

All of this work is designed to provide evidence to service providers, policy makers, advocates and funders who are working to prevent and end youth homelessness.

The work is led by a research and policy team that includes Dr. Melissa Kull, a researcher with expertise in housing and homelessness, and Chapin Hall Research Fellow Dr. Amy Dworsky, who brings her considerable experience in foster youth research to the Voices work.

For more information about Voices of Youth Count, please visit our website or contact us at voyc@chapinhall.org.