A Way Home America: Building Systems to End Youth and Family Homelessness

Mary Ann Haley, Deputy Director

This year’s Annual National Alliance to End Homelessness Conference offered an array of workshops which focused on building systems to end youth and family homelessness by 2020. A great addition was the convening of “A Way Home America” workshop on Monday, July 25, 2016 in which communities from around the country shared some of their challenges and strategies to tackle youth homelessness. For more information, click here.

Another great youth resource was the presentation by Sam Margoulis of Youth Harbors in Massachusetts. Working in schools, Youth Harbors engages youth and connects them with services. For information on some of their prevention and intervention strategies, click here. Other workshops on youth included harm reduction strategies, youth housing models, and crisis response systems for youth.

Rapid Re-housing Resources

Rapid Re-housing was another featured track, with a great presentation on case management. Some very helpful tools for case management were shared; including indicators for closing a case, flow charts for case closings, and an exit planning worksheet from Orgcode. Another important topic covered was the role of shelters in ending homelessness, with a brief overview of five keys to developing the best shelter possible shared here.