Child Welfare
Ana Valdes of the Palm Beach Post breaks down yesterday’s GAO report about psychotropic medications and foster youths, and snared a quote from an Obama official about his motivation to act on this issue.
Jenny Gold of NPR also reports on the report here.
Click here for Youth Today’s story on the report, what the Obama administration is doing about the issue now, and what might come down the pike in terms of regulations.
Expanding mandatory reporting laws might do more harm than good, reports Andrew Longstreth of Reuters, after interviewing several child welfare pundits and research. A number of states have mulled the notion of expanding on their reporting laws since the Penn State scandal last month.
Connecticut’s child welfare ombudsman believes adoptions need to be monitored by the state in light of the allegations of sexual abuse by an adoptive couple.
Education/Jobs
A website called The Moral Liberal said the Department of Labor “is revising its child labor laws so stringently that anyone 16 and under will be forbidden from seeking employment on farms due to safety concerns.”
Wyoming is considering raising the age at which students are allowed to drop out of school from 16 to 18, reports the Associated Press.
Also from the AP: Wells Fargo is lowering its fixed interest rates for student loans to undergraduates.
The Huffington Post’s Chris Kirkham breaks down a report from the National Consumer Law Center that found many state higher-education departments lack adequate resources to follow up on student complaints on such issues as overstated promises about career placement or troubles with financial aid and billing.
Juvenile Justice
No need to do anything here but quote the lead paragraph of Associated Press reporter Jeri Clausing: A 13-year-old was handcuffed and hauled off to a juvenile detention for burping in class, according to a lawsuit filed against an Albuquerque school principal, a teacher and school police officer.
Lynnsey Gardner and Carter Coyle of WRDW in Georgia provide a detailed timeline starting with the death of a young man in the state’s Augusta Youth Development Campus. It appears the reporters intend to update the timeline as the investigation into what happened continues.
