Family & Youth Initiative

Family & Youth Initiative (DCFYI) is a community-based organization serving DC teens in foster care as well as young adults who have aged out of care through programming designed to build community and social capita. Wea re the only area organization, and one of few nationally, that focuses solely on ensuring that teens in foster care create long-term relationships with caring adults.

Our mission is to create a supportive community and lasting relationships for teens and young adults who are in or have aged out of foster care. 

DCFYI programming assists youth in attaining life goals through robust, positive adult
and peer networks, the ability to navigate and maintain relationships, increased self-confidence and problem-solving skills, and academic and/or vocational success. Our central outcome is to facilitate relationships with caring adults, the most long-lasting and impactful of which is adoption. We implement programing through the following core areas:

Community Building: DCFYI builds a network of support and community through monthly
events, where teens and volunteers have the opportunity to get to know one another, bond, and build relationships. We share a meal at the end of every activity. Through these events DCFYI wraps community around teens, leading some teens to refer to DCFYI as their “family” - the people who celebrate birthdays, are in the audience for performances and graduations, help with college applications and successfully transitioning to college, problem solve, and serve as a consistent source of support.

Mentorships and Host Families: Through events, teens and volunteers have the opportunity to build relationships, leading to adult-teen matches, whether for mentoring or weekend hosting. Our goal is to match all teens with a DCFYI mentor so they have a stable and trusted adult to call on for advice and support across all areas of their lives. We require mentors to commit at least two years to a mentoring relationship, although most mentor-mentee relationships last much longer. Mentors are asked to spend at least eight hours a month with their mentee, although most exceed that requirement. Host families serve a similar role but welcome teens into their home for weekend visits over a finite period. The host parents build a deeper relationship with the teen and then serve as the teen's adoption "advocate," helping him or her meet other adults to expand the circles of people who know the teen and increase opportunities to find an adoptive family.

Adoption Placement: By allowing adults and teens to build a stable long-term relationships, we also increase the number of adoptive families for teens. DCFYI helps several teens a year find adoptive homes, in large part due to our model of organic relationship building. Because of questions about who teens in foster care are and what it would be like to parent one, most adults need opportunity to know them before they will consider adoption. If a DCFYI volunteer decides they are interested in adopting a teen, we refer them to Barker Adoption Foundation or DC Child and Family Services for the training and home study. We act as teens' advocates during this process, ensuring that it goes as smoothly as possible.

Open Table is a national model in which a “Table” of six to eight trained volunteers
commit to weekly meetings with a youth for one year (as well as some one-on-one contact). The Table’s sole purpose is to support the young person in achieving whatever goals they set for themselves. At the end of the Table year, youth and volunteers decide how they would like to remain in contact.