#DCFY18 Budget Advocacy: $2M in Transportation Subsidies for Nontraditional Students

Throughout budget season, we’ll be sharing talking points around the #DCFY18 Budget as it relates to our asks of Council and the Mayor for DCAYA’s key issue areas. You can reference our previous spotlight on Expanded Learning here. We’ll continue this week with Disconnected Youth.

THE ASK: $2 million to expand the unlimited bus and rail component of the School Transit Subsidy program (i.e., Kids Ride Free) to all District residents enrolled in publicly funded adult education programs.

While the Council has made progress towards expanding the program by introducing the Adult Learners Transit Subsidy Amendment Act of 2017, our ask needs to be funded in this budget cycle to ensure adult learners and re-engaging youth receive transportation support in the next year. We are requesting that the expansion is legislated through this year’s Budget Support Act to ensure the program is adequately legislated and funded.

NOW: Why additional transportation funding matters to youth, and why we believe it is a sound investment in FY18

• Significant Financial Burden: Re-engaging youth and adult learners balance many competing demands to prioritize their return to school. Unlike students under age 22—who have free Metro and bus transportation through Kids Ride Free—students aged 22+ pay the full price. In 2016, a DCAYA survey of re-engaging youth ages 22-24 found that 83% of respondents were spending approximately one-fifth or more of their income getting to and from their programs. Such high spending on transportation means there’s less money available for students to keep themselves and their families financially stable.
  
• Undermines DC’s second-chance system: Expanding the program with $2 million stands to leverage the District’s current investment of over $80 million in local and federal dollars to support educational instruction for adult learners. If students cannot afford to get to class, they can’t fully benefit from these investments in their success. DCAYA’s survey also found 21% of surveyed youth 22-24 missed class 3 or more times a month due to insufficient transportation funds. Most programs are less than 40 weeks long, so these youth missed 13% of their program’s total class time because they could not afford to get there.
  
• The Problem Will Get Worse: Metro will move forward with a fare hike in July. Currently, taking the bus to class can cost a student $70 per month. The $0.25 bus fare hike will add $10 to that monthly expense. With many DC households living on less than $10,000 a year, transportation costs for just one person could consume 10 percent of a family’s limited income.
  
• The Expansion Leverages Existing Policy: Through Kids Ride Free, DDOT and WMATA have negotiated a contractually-bound daily rate for each pupil of $0.65. Therefore, the cost of providing transportation assistance through Kids Ride Free is likely to be much more cost effective than other ways of funding such a program. 

HOW: Help advocate for transportation funding in the #DCFY18 Budget

• Please sign up to testify at the Budget Hearing for the District Department of Transportation on Monday, April 24, 2017 at 11 am in Room 500 of the John A. Wilson Building at 1350 Pennsylvania Avenue NW.
  
• To sign up to testify, please email Aukima Benjamin at abenjamin@dccouncil.us or call 202-724-8062.
  
• Whether or not you can testify at the hearing, please email, call, and/or tweet your Councilmember(s) in support of our ask using the hashtag #KeepStudentsOnTrack. For sample tweets, scripts and Council contact information, check these out: Transportation Email, Call, & Tweet Scripts. 

NEXT: Please check back here next week for more on our Youth Homelessness #DCFY18 budget ask.


And in case you missed it, here's our Actions for Budget Advocacy - Week 2 email for more ways to get involved this budget season!

Transportation Advocacy Letter for Re-engaging Youth & Adult Learners

DCAYA and our partners at the Adult and Family Literacy Coalition (DC AFLC) have drafted a letter to the City Administrator and Mayor's Budget Director that we'd like to have as many of our members, providers working with disconnected youth, and individual supporters as possible sign on to by Wednesday, February 22nd.

It is our goal to both elevate this ask as the Mayor's team develops her proposed budget, and to garner widespread support among Councilmembers and other key stakeholders in the case this ask will require Council advocacy later in the budget cycle. The letter applauds the DME's transportation report and recommendations, and reiterates the importance of supporting the District's adult and alternative education students.

The letter reads as follows. If you or your organization would like to be included as a signatory, please click on the link toward the end of this post to contact Amy Dudas (amy@dc-aya.org)with the name and title of the organization or individual you'd like to include on the letter:

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February 24, 2017

Dear City Administrator Young and Budget Director Brown:

We, the undersigned, want to thank you for the leadership and commitment the Bowser Administration has demonstrated in exploring the transportation needs of the District’s adult learners, alternative education students, and formerly disconnected youth. In the effort to develop an effective and efficient policy solution to the persistent barrier transportation costs pose to this population of students, the Deputy Mayor for Education’s “Report on the Need for Transportation Subsidies and Assistance for Adult Learners” identified a much-needed path forward. As providers of and advocates for adult and alternative education, we especially appreciate the Office of the State Superintendent of Education’s and the Deputy Mayor for Education’s collaboration to identify the unmet need for transportation subsidies among these students, the impact of increased transportation costs on attendance and enrollment for this population, and the options available to provide affordable access to transportation for these learners.

Supporting Disconnected Youth & Adult Learners this #AEFLWeek

In today’s blog, we’d like to share the work of our colleagues at the Adult and Family Literacy Coalition (DC AFLC) @DCAdultEdu. DCAYA’s connection to this work stems from our interest in stable, thriving families as foundations of youth success, and as a function of the disparate definitions of accessibility across the educational and workforce opportunities available to re-engaging youth. 

As councilmember David Grosso, Chairperson of the Committee on Education, noted in a hearing last session, “If children are not learning the skills they need to complete high school, and their parents do not have their high school education, then we are nowhere near breaking cycles of poverty and/or inequality.” At that same hearing, DC Council Chairman Phil Mendelson underscored, “A 2002 estimate indicates that 37% of adults age 16 and over in the District of Columbia operate at the lowest defined level of literacy, or below basic. This compares to national averages of 21-23% of adults scoring at the below basic level.” 

Clearly, the need to address the pervasive barriers to success for DC’s disconnected youth and adult learners is profound. Read on to learn more about how we can align our work in the coming advocacy season!

Washington, DC, is a city of extremes in education. On the one hand, the District has one of the most highly educated populations in the United States. According to research from Georgetown University’s Center on Education and the Workforce, 71 percent of all jobs in the District of Columbia will require additional education beyond a high school credential—either some postsecondary education or training—by 2018.

At the same time, one in three DC adults have trouble reading a map or completing a job application, and more than 21 percent of DC’s working-age adults—more than 60,000 individuals—lack a high school diploma.

Low literacy and low educational attainment are root causes of poverty, unemployment, homelessness, and poor health. Adults without a high school diploma are more than seven times as likely to live in poverty as are those with a credential. National Adult Education and Family Literacy Week (September 26-October 1) is an opportunity to raise awareness around the need for and impact of adult education and celebrate the accomplishments of DC’s adult learners.

Members of DC AFLC will also spend the week highlighting the barriers adult learner face in their pursuit of an education and policy solutions that seek to remove those roadblocks. At the top of that list is the lack of access to affordable transportation. A recent survey of nearly 1000 adult learners across the District conducted by the Deputy Mayor for Education’s Transportation Task Force found that 62% of adult learners depend on public transportation for their commute to and from school (52% on bus and 10% on rail). Of those adult learners, 41% say their biggest concern about their commute is the cost of transportation, and more than a quarter say that issues with transportation have caused them to miss school occasionally or often.

Unfortunately, adult education providers have few options for providing transportation assistance to learners. The majority of learners enrolled in classes fall outside the age range for the Kids Ride Free Program, and while DDOT offers subsidized tokens for K-12 schools, that subsidy is not offered to adult education providers. Therefore, any assistance is reliant on the budget of the providers—often tight themselves.

When adult learners choose to come back to school, they are making a significant investment to do so. They invest their time: learners often arrive to class after they’ve already dropped their kids off at school and/or finished a shift at work. And when classes are over, they head back out to retrace their steps. They invest their energy: knowing that a credential is the key to moving closer to their goals, learners walk through the doors on their own volition. They are not mandated to do so, and it’s up to them to return the next day. And they invest resources from their limited budgets.

Adult learners are investing in their future—and that of their family—when they choose to come back to school. Likewise, The District has made an important investment in adult education. Now we need to go further and ensure that adult learners have the tools they need to get to school, so they can move up and move on to the next step in their lives. This AEFL Week, DC AFLC members will be asking DC Council to do just that.

For more information on how you can get involved in National Adult Education and Family Literacy Week or the work of the DC Adult and Family Literacy Coalition (DC AFLC), please contact Jamie Kamlet at dc-aflc@aohdc.org.

DCAYA's Budget Updates: Workforce Development & Disconnected Youth!

While the final vote on the FY17 budget will occur on May 31^st at 10am (watch here: http://dccouncil.us/videos), the Council’s decisions are all but finalized.

Today we’d like to reflect on the work of our members and partners throughout this year’s advocacy season and provide an update on the successes for youth, families, and children within the FY17 budget. This week’s is the first of two parts, focusing on Youth Workforce Development and Disconnected Youth. 

Youth Workforce Development

Maintenance of In-School Youth Program

This spring, DCAYA advocated for the continuation of the In-School Youth Program with available federal funds-- and supplemental local funds if necessary. Under WIOA, federal expenditures for in school programs will be reduced to a maximum of 25% of the District’s total federal allocation of $2.3 million annually. Because the District has significantly underspent federal funds in the last few years, the In-School Youth Program appears safe in FY17. DC’s Draft WIOA State Plan includes a proposed strategy to blend the District’s reduced in school allocation with funding that flows through the Rehabilitation Services Administration (RSA) to make all in school youth programs accessible to youth with disabilities. We will continue to advocate for capacity building support within the program’s competitively selected providers to ensure that they have the training necessary to provide quality programming to youth with disabilities. We’d like to thank our members and partners from LAYC, Sasha Bruce, DCFPI and the Young Women’s Project for attending the WIOA State Plan Public Engagement Session to elevate this priority and for testifying at DOES’s budget oversight hearing.

SYEP Expansion and Evaluation

Full Report Available Here

While the FY17 budget includes $4.8M to fully fund the participation of 12,000 youth 14-21 and 1,000 youth 22-24, DCAYA and our partners were successful in ensuring that the continuation of this expansion be tied to the consistent assessment and evaluation of its quality. Earlier this spring, the DC Council added an amendment to Mayor Bower’s Marion S. Barry Summer Youth Employment Expansion Amendment Act of 2016. The amendment limits the expansion of SYEP to the summers of 2016 and 2017 in order to allow Council adequate time to review and assess data regarding the program's expansion during 2015 while working with the Executive to formulate a permanent program that appropriately meets the needs of the targeted populations, including disconnected youth. Additionally, the DC Auditor’s report on SYEP concluded that to meet legislated program requirements moving forward, DOES will have to contract with an external expert to conduct a third-party, program quality evaluation of the program annually. Big thanks are due to Councilmember Silverman and her staff, Councilmembers Nadeau and Allen for promoting the quality and assessment of SYEP, and to DOES’s Office of Youth Programs for working to provide the best possible program to over 13,000 District youth every summer.

Disconnected Youth

Expansion of Kids Ride Free through Age 24

This year, DCAYA advocated for an additional investment of $950,000 to expand the age eligibility of Kids Ride Free through age 24 in order to meet the transportation needs of over 700 youth engaged in alternative and adult education placements. Building on the evidence elevated by Raise DC’s Disconnected Youth Change Network (DYCN), DCAYA designed a survey of re-engaging youth this winter and circulated it through DYCN’s membership. Our findings provided a basis for a cost estimate of our budget ask and highlighted the importance of funding transportation supports to maximize the District’s investments in nontraditional students.

During budget advocacy, DCAYA also supported the ask of the DC Adult and Family Literacy Coalition (DC AFLC) to extend the availability of subsidized tokens to adult education providers to help offset the cost of transportation for their students. While neither of these asks were able to be funded in the FY17 budget, our advocacy did result in the addition of language in the Budget Support Act requiring the Deputy Mayor for Education (DME) to fully assess the transportation needs of the District’s adult and alternative education population by October 1, 2016. Even though our budget requests were not granted by Council this year, we mounted a strong campaign and are certain that our champions on the Council will find the funding next year.

This year’s effort was made possible by the work of Raise DC’S Disconnected Youth Change Network in vetting and circulating our transportation survey, our partners at DC AFLC and Academy of Hope for supporting our ask, the Council’s Budget Office and the staff of the Committees on Education and Transportation & the Environment for working to identify the needed funding, the DME for initiating a Transportation Taskforce earlier this year, and to Councilmember Silverman for including our ask on the Committee of the Whole’s final ‘budget wishlist’.

Maintain Funding for SLED

Throughout the FY17 budget season, the Mayor’s $1.1M proposed investment to keep SLED stable and fully staffed and $11.9M to develop the capacity of the system in capital funds were maintained. SLED continues to play an invaluable role in driving the District’s education system decisions, and also serves as a starting point for the development of a similar approach within the workforce development sector. Many thanks are due to the Mayor, DME Niles, and Superintendent Kang for prioritizing the maintenance of SLED in the Mayor’s proposed budget, and to the Committee on Education for ensuring the protection of these funds through the budget process. We’d also like to thank our partners at Raise DC for spearheading important and insightful educational research that brings the fruit of SLED to bear.

That’s all for now folks! Check back next week for more budget updates on Expanding Learning and Youth Homelessness.

For more on youth issues in DC you can FOLLOW us on Twitter, LIKE us on Facebook, SUBSCRIBE to this blog and VISIT us at www.dc-aya.org.

Help Us #KeepDYOnTrack this Advocacy Season!

This week, we're kicking off our series on DCAYA's big budget asks for FY17. Expanding transportation subsidies for older students was not included in Mayor Bowser's proposed budget-- but we are prepared to keep advocating for our youth who have re-engaged in education! Earlier this year, DCAYA worked with our partners at Raise DC's Disconnected Youth Change Network (DYCN) to conduct a youth survey on transportation. Below you'll find the advocacy resources we identified. 

You can find the full report of our findings here: Issue Briefing on the Transportation Needs of Re-engaging Youth.

THE ASK: An additional investment of $950,000 will ensure that youth (ages 22-24) who have overcome multiple barriers to re-engage in their education at a Local Education Agency (LEA) are able to attend school without the persistent worry of how they will afford to get there. This estimate is based on the average weekly cost of transportation that students reported to DCAYA via the DYCN Youth Transportation Survey ($30/ week on average) and OSSE’s reported number of youth aged 22-24 enrolled in DC schools (LEAs) in 2015 (721).

TALKING POINTS:

No District-wide support for the transportation needs of students 22+

·   No youth 22 or older has access to any citywide transportation aids. The District's Student Transit Subsidy Program (includes Kids Ride Free and subsidized passes) is available to youth ages 5-21.

Absence of transportation support significantly affects 22-24 year old students

·        Transportation is a significant expense for District youth. 54% of survey respondents 22-24 reported spending over $30 a week or $120 a month travelling to and from their programs.

·         Despite the high cost of transportation, youth are prioritizing their education. The majority of older youth surveyed reported spending 45% or more of their weekly income getting to and from their educational programs.

 ·         Transportation costs are high for all youth, but those living east of the river are the hardest hit. 83% of all youth 22-24 reported spending approximately one-fifth or more of their weekly income getting to and from their programs; notably 55% of these youth live in Wards 5, 7, and 8.

Impact of DC’s second-chance system investments relies on access to affordable transportation

·     When transportation costs are so high, showing up to class is half the battle for re-engaging youth. 21% of older youth reported missing class 3 or more times a month due to insufficient transportation funds. Most programs are less than 40 weeks long, so youth are missing 13% of their program’s total class time because they cannot afford to get there.

·     The loss of economic productivity and social costs associated with disconnected youth are profound. The roughly 7,500 currently disconnected students[1] in DC cost taxpayers (in lost earnings) roughly $13,900 each annually, for a total of $104 million every year. When you add in the annual per-student social cost (subsidized health care, income assistance, higher rates of criminal justice involvement) of $37,450 associated with disconnection, that’s an additional $281 million a year.[2]

THE NEXT STEPS:

      1. Testify and elevate youth narrative: Council needs to hear from you and your youth about the ways transportation costs affect student persistence and success. Over the next several weeks, we ask that you prepare testimony and work with your youth to provide examples of the need for expanded transportation support for youth 16-24. 

District Department of Transportation (DDOT)
Budget Hearing: Friday, April 8, 2016 at 11 am in Room 500

To testify, contact Aukima Benjamin, abenjamin@dccouncil.us or 202-724-8062

Office of the Deputy Mayor for Education (DME)
Budget Hearing: Wednesday, April 13, 2016 at 10 am in Room 120

Sign up here or call 202-724-8061

Office of the State Superintendent of Education (OSSE)

Budget Hearing: Monday, April 18, 2016 at 10 am in Room 412

Sign up here or call 202-724-8061

Washington Metropolitan Area Transit Authority (WMATA)

Budget Hearing: Monday, April 25, 2016 at 10 am in Room 412

To testify, contact Sarina Loy, sloy@dccouncil.us or 202-724-8058

2. Contact councilmembers to elevate ask & youth narrative

COUNCILMEMBER	AGENCY OVERSIGHT (HEARING DATE)	COMMITTEES	EMAIL	TWITTER
Mary Cheh*	DDOT (4/8)	Transportation & Environment (Chairperson)	mcheh@dccouncil.us	@marycheh
Jack Evans*	DDOT (4/8) WMATA (4/25)	Transportation & Environment Finance & Revenue (Chairperson)	jevans@dccouncil.us	@JackEvansWard2
Brandon Todd*	DDOT (4/8) DME (4/13)	Transportation & Environment  Education	btodd@dccouncil.us	@CMBrandonTodd
Kenyan McDuffie*	DDOT (4/8) WMATA (4/25)	Transportation & Environment  Finance & Revenue	kmcduffie@dccouncil.us	@CM_McDuffie
Charles Allen*	DDOT (4/8) DME (4/13)	Transportation & Environment Education	callen@dccouncil.us	@CharlesAllenW6
David Grosso*	DME (4/13) WMATA (4/25)	Education (Chairperson)  Finance & Revenue	dgrosso@dccouncil.us	@cmdgrosso
Vincent Orange	WMATA (4/25)	Finance & Revenue	vorange@dccouncil.us	@VOrangeDC
Elissa Silverman	WMATA (4/25)	Finance & Revenue	esilverman@dccouncil.us	@tweetelissa
Yvette Alexander	DME (4/13)	Education	yalexander@dccouncil.us	@CMYMA
Anita Bonds	DME (4/13)	Education	abonds@dccouncil.us	@AnitaBondsDC

*Indicates high influence for our budget ask

3. Use Sample Tweets (.@Councilmember)

(.@Councilmember) Please fund Kids Ride Free expansion for youth 22-24 to help #KeepDYOnTrack. #DCFY17

(.@Councilmember) Surveyed youth 22-24 lack transportation supports, over half spending 45% of income getting to class #KeepDYOnTrack #DCFY17

(.@Councilmember) 21% of surveyed youth 22-24 miss 3+ days of class/month bc they can’t afford transportation #KeepDYOnTrack #DCFY17

(.@Councilmember) Showing up is half the battle: students 22-24 are struggling to afford their trip to class #KeepDYOnTrack. #DCFY17

That's all for now! We hope to see you at the Wilson Building this advocacy season!

Amy Dudas is the disconnected youth and workforce development policy analyst at DC Alliance of Youth Advocates. If you have any questions about today's blog, or would like more information on our transportation advocacy please contact her at amy@dc-aya.org.

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[1] OSSE. (2014) “Bridging LEAs to Resources for Enhanced Student Outcomes” Online at: http://osse.dc.gov/sites/default/files/dc/sites/osse/publication/attachments/OSSE_T1S3_FINAL%20PRESENTATION_%20110714_YDA.pdf

[2] Belfield, Levin, & Rosen (2012). The Economic Value of Opportunity Youth. Civic Enterprises. Online at:

http://www.civicenterprises.net/MediaLibrary/Docs/econ_value_opportunity_youth.pdf.