Understanding profiles of youth who use the Casey Life skills assessment

Developing independent living skills is an important part of transitioning to adulthood for youth who are aging out of the foster care system. In order for youth to gain these skills, assessments are a key tool that case managers and others working with youth use to create individualized plans for youth to obtain these skills. This study analyzes 194,108 Casey Life Skills assessments completed by youth across the country, to understand profiles of youth and support practitioners in administering these assessments. Overall, the findings shows that youth scored high on the assessment, with mean scores higher on relationships and communication and lower on housing and money management—highlighting the need for concrete support. Using Latent Profile Analysis, the study identifies four groups of youth detailed in the paper: [1] low in all domains, [2] moderate relational, low tangible, [3] high relational, moderate tangible, [4] high in all domains. Using multinormal logit models, the study subsequently identifies demographic characteristics that influence assignment into each class: notably, youth who identified as Vietnamese, gender non-binary, or transgender were more likely to be in the “low in all domains” category. Implications for policy and practice are discussed.