Educational outcomes for students who have experienced foster care are problematic. For the small percentage of foster kids who go to college, making it to graduation is difficult given the constellation of factors often present in the lives of young people who experienced foster care, including and notably a lack of formal and informal supports. “Anything that we can do to wrap support around them can be helpful in better outcomes for students,” says Clinical Associate Professor, Alice Egan.

The Sandra Rosenbaum School of Social of Social Work regularly has students who are alums of the foster care system, in addition to social workers frequently serving current and former foster youth.

Faculty from the school actively participate in a new UW-Madison Division of Community Services program, Fostering Success for Independent Badger Scholars. The program provides former foster students material support, a designated space where students can work and access resources, as well as available mentoring by campus faculty and staff. 

The idea for this program started in conversations after a panel presentation hosted by the Division of Continuing Studies in fall of 2024 called, “Foster Youth College Transitions,” that Egan and others participated in.  “A group of us started meeting regularly, and by the end of last summer 2025 the program was up and running,” she said.

Egan, who is also the Child Welfare Training Program Coordinator, is a member of the steering committee and has coordinated training programs for campus members. School faculty have led several of the training sessions including Clinical Professor Angela Willis, (“Trauma Informed Mentoring”) and Emeritus Professor Tracy Schroepfer (“Boundaries for Mentors”). Current MSW student Pricilla Reyes, who works directly with current and former foster youth entering independent living as the Community Resource Specialist with the Workforce Development Board, is also part of the steering committee.

Clearly, participation in this program is natural for the school given the school and social work’s long commitment to child welfare services.