Back in 2018, when I served as the deputy executive director of the Colorado Department of Human Services, data from our partners at the Colorado Department of Education revealed that though the overall 4-year high school graduation rate in our state was above 80%, youth in foster care had a graduation rate of about 23%. Further, we learned half of Colorado students in our foster care system were changing schools at least once, and often several times each year, disrupting their learning – studies show that each time a student moves schools, they lose four months of academic progress – and emotional stability.

Safe, free and easy-to-use transportation directly from foster home to school is imperative to helping these young people get to school.

Think about this: What happens when a child in foster care changes foster homes in a different school district at 5 p.m. on Tuesday night during the middle of the school year? That child has a federal right to remain at that school, but school districts can’t provide transportation outside of their boundaries. And even if they could, there’s no way a district can reroute its bus system to accommodate that child by 8 a.m. Wednesday morning. We at the Department of Human services in partnership with the Colorado Department of Education were determined to find a way to solve this problem.

With support from the General Assembly, we passed HB18-1306, which created an education stabilization grant program to fund these transportation services, ensuring students could still attend their school of origin. After accomplishing that legislative hurdle, we thought the next steps would be easy. Little did we know the real challenge was finding a service provider both highly qualified to transport students and dynamic enough to work outside the school district-designed transportation model. Though school districts have obligations to ensure school-of-origin transportation for their students in the foster care system, contracts to facilitate that service are often with county child welfare organizations. It isn’t always as easy as putting a child in foster care on the school bus. The solution had to work outside of these limitations to get young people across district and county boundaries.

When the state Department of Human Services released a request for proposal for this type of transportation service, it did not receive any qualified applicants. We began researching how other foster service agencies solved this problem. Los Angeles County – the largest child welfare system in the country – was using a Transportation Network Company (TNC), HopSkipDrive. It was this outside-the-box thinking we needed to bring to Colorado.

We determined HopSkipDrive could replicate their model in Colorado under the regulations of the Public Utilities Commission (PUC), which strictly regulates TNCs.

Through local and county governments, HopSkipDrive has provided more than 49,000 rides for kids in foster care. This is 49,000 times a student was able to get access to a stable school environment.

Thankfully, our work continues. This legislative session the Colorado State Legislature voted to support SB 22-144, which clarifies that TNCs can continue partnerships with school districts and county child welfare agencies.

I’m hopeful that this legislation will preserve the solution we fought for in 2018, cementing alternative solutions like HopSkipDrive into our student transportation infrastructure and, with that, new data will show graduation rates for foster youth on the rise.

Jerene Petersen served as the Deputy Executive Director of the Colorado Department of Human Services under Governors Hickenlooper and Polis. She consults in the area of Child Welfare, is an Advisory Board Member to Denver Human Services and an Executive Advisor to Mile High United Way. Jerene also serves as a Polis Administration appointee to the Child Protective Ombudsman Board and is a CASA Volunteer.