The Imprint Weekly

The Imprint
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The Imprint Weekly Podcast offers listeners a regular review of news and trends in America's child welfare and juvenile justice systems, along with other critical services for youth and families. Join Imprint Senior Editor John Kelly for a discussion of the week's major headlines, plus interviews with leaders in the field.

  1. 3D AGO

    Final Thoughts on 2025 with Marina Nitze

    We will post our annual “Best of The Imprint Weekly Podcast” show next, but this is the last new episode of 2025. Frequent guest Marina Nitze, a child welfare and tech expert, joined to discuss the flurry of federal activity on child welfare since the end of the federal shutdown.  Marina Nitze is a crisis engineer helping organizations solve mission-critical challenges, with a particular focus on improving America’s child welfare system. She’s co-author of Crisis Engineering and Hack Your Bureaucracy, and helps organize the Child Welfare Playbook. Reading Room White House Watch https://imprintnews.org/special-series/white-house-watch Kinship Licensing, with Marina Nitze https://imprintnews.org/podcast/headlines-kinship-licensing-marina-nitze The Child Welfare Playbook, with Marina Nitze https://imprintnews.org/podcast/child-welfare-playbook-marina-nitze

    54 min

  2. DEC 15

    Trump’s Top Child Welfare Official: An Interview with Alex Adams

    On this week's episode, Imprint reporter Michael Fitzgerald was in Washington last week to interview Alex Adams, who was confirmed in October to serve as the Assistant Secretary for Family Support at the Administration for Children and Families. Fitzgerald asked Adams about a wide range of subjects. They discussed the administration’s goal of “A Home for Every Child” and how Adams plans to achieve that; how and why he plans to "barbecue" much of the regulatory language for states when it comes to federal funding and practice; why the administration has made demands that states roll back policies that are meant to protect LGBTQ+ youth; the role of kinship caregivers; and much more.  Thanks to iFoster and Binti for sponsoring this episode of The Imprint Weekly Podcast. Reading Room It’s Newsmatch season! Please consider donating to support this podcast and the incredible work that our Imprint reporters do every day. If you donate this month, your contribution will be DOUBLED! www.Imprintnews.org/donate White House Watch: Our Ongoing Coverage https://imprintnews.org/special-series/white-house-watch Alex Adams Nominated to Lead Administration for Children and Families https://imprintnews.org/youth-services-insider/alex-adams-nominated-to-lead-administration-for-children-and-families/259907 Trump’s Child Welfare Leader Vows to Protect Benefits Paid to Foster Youth https://imprintnews.org/youth-services-insider/adams-vows-curb-abusive-practice-foster-youth-benefits/268451 Trump Appointee Demands States Roll Back Foster Parenting Rules That Aim to Protect LGBTQ+ Youth  https://bit.ly/453vaxF Trump’s Child Welfare Leader Vows to Protect Benefits Paid to Foster Youth https://imprintnews.org/youth-services-insider/adams-vows-curb-abusive-practice-foster-youth-benefits/268451 Idaho Child Welfare Leader Pushed Rapid Reforms in Brief Tenure Before Trump Appointment To Federal Office https://imprintnews.org/top-stories/idaho-child-welfare-leader-pushed-rapid-reforms-in-brief-tenure-before-trump-nomination-to-federal-office/267413 Oregon Senator Presses Trump Admin for Action on Foster Care, Head Start and Migrant Youth https://imprintnews.org/youth-services-insider/oregon-senator-presses-trump-admin-for-action-on-foster-care-head-start-and-migrant-youth/268868 Acronyms and initials used in this interview: TANF: Temporary Assistance for Needy Families CFSR: Child and Family Services Reviews PIP: Program Improvement Plan APSR: Annual Progress and Services Report SSBG: Social Services Block Grant CSBG: Community Services Block Grant RGA Republic Governors Association FYI: Foster Youth to Independence ETV: Chafee Education and Training Voucher

    1h 19m

  3. DEC 8

    College Stability After Homelessness or Foster Care, with Maddy Day

    On this week’s podcast Maddy Day of Maddy Day and Associates joins to talk about what it takes to provide stability on college campuses for youth who have experienced aging out of foster care, homelessness or both. She is helping to coordinate a Congressional briefing planned for 2026 on the subject.  It’s Newsmatch season! Please consider donating to support this podcast and the incredible work that our Imprint reporters do every day. If you donate this month, your contribution will be DOUBLED! www.Imprintnews.org/donate Maddy Day is the founder of Maddy Day and Associates. She co-founded the University of Washington Champions Program, in 2010, and directed the Fostering Success Michigan statewide initiative at Western Michigan University until 2018. Reading Room Why Isn’t Community College Working for So Many Foster Youth?https://imprintnews.org/podcast/why-community-college-not-working-so-many-foster-youth Making my Dream of Attending College Possible https://imprintnews.org/youth-voice/making-my-dream-of-attending-college-possible/64932 Grieving the Loss of Housing and My Mother While Navigating College as a Foster Youth https://imprintnews.org/youth-voice/grieving-the-loss-of-housing-and-my-mother-while-navigating-college-as-a-foster-youth/65080 The Imprint’s Archive of Education https://imprintnews.org/topic/education

    1h 3m

  4. DEC 2

    Trump’s Second Term Child Welfare Agenda

    President Trump’s White House event announcing an executive order on foster care got a lot of attention. But it is not the only indicator of what the administration might have in mind for policy making in child welfare during his second term. We dive into the specifics of the executive order and several other interesting announcements from Trump’s team, then step back and try to describe the big picture.  It’s Newsmatch season! Please consider donating to support this podcast and the incredible work that our Imprint reporters do every day. If you donate this month, your contribution will be DOUBLED! www.Imprintnews.org/donate Reading Room 2025 Imprint Reporting Highlights Discussion, Tuesday, Nov. 9, 10am PST/1pm EST https://imprintnews.org/event/2025-imprint-reporting-highlights With New Executive Order, Trump Thrusts Foster Care Into National Spotlight https://imprintnews.org/top-stories/with-new-executive-order-trump-thrusts-foster-care-into-national-spotlight/268739 The Other Trump Child Welfare Doctrine Issued This Month https://imprintnews.org/youth-services-insider/the-other-trump-child-welfare-doctrine-issued-this-month/268999 Trump Administration Says It’s Aiming to Significantly Increase Foster Home Capacity https://imprintnews.org/top-stories/trump-administration-to-increase-foster-home-capacity/268969 Trump’s Child Welfare Leader Vows to Protect Benefits Paid to Foster Youth https://imprintnews.org/youth-services-insider/adams-vows-curb-abusive-practice-foster-youth-benefits/268451 Trump Administration Grants Waiver Permitting Discrimination by Child Welfare Providers https://imprintnews.org/featured/trump-grants-waiver-permitting-discrimination-by-child-welfare-providers/33541 Designated Placements In, Conversion Therapy Out: Biden’s Rule for LGBTQ+ Foster Youth https://imprintnews.org/youth-services-insider/new-biden-rule-lgbtq-placements-in-conversion-therapy-out/249274 Tech Alphabet Soup and Child Welfare, with Carole Hussey https://imprintnews.org/podcast/tech-alphabet-soup-child-welfare

    35 min

  5. NOV 26

    InnerViews – Becoming the Woman I Am: Faith, Family & the Future

    In this powerful season finale, Ivory reflects on a transformative year—motherhood through kinship adoption, buying her first home, navigating love, and preparing for preventive surgeries after testing BRCA2+. Joined by spiritual healer and author Lorna J. Hines, she explores faith, ancestry, and healing beyond appearance. This conversation offers gentle truth: you can struggle and still be sacred. You can ache and still be anointed. And you, too, deserve good things.

    1h 10m

  6. NOV 16

    From the Barber’s Chair to the BRO Experience, with Barry Cooper

    Barry Cooper is founder of the BRO Experience, a Brooklyn-based organization that uses cognitive behavioral therapy at the center of its approach to mental health support for young men of color. He is among this year’s winners of the David Prize, which each year goes to five New Yorkers with an extraordinary idea for change. Cooper joined us to discuss his own adolescence growing up in the Bedford Stuyvesant neighborhood of Brooklyn, and how his first early career as a barber informed his approach with the BRO Experience. We also talked about a new short documentary about the organization — We All Deserve to Be Well — and what he plans to do with the $200,000 that comes with the David Prize. Note one: We will discuss President Trump’s executive order on foster care in a subsequent episode, but a link to reporter Michael Fitzgerald’s coverage of the order is in our show notes.  Note two: It’s Newsmatch season! Any donation to The Imprint for the rest of the year will be DOUBLED, so please consider supporting this show and everything else we do here at The Imprint. To support our work visit: www.Imprintnews.org/donate Reading Room The BRO Experience https://www.thebroexperience.org/ We All Deserve to Be Well (Trailer) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CmY6hyXG5j8&t=10s The David Prize https://thedavidprize.org/ With New Executive Order, Trump Thrusts Foster Care Into National Spotlight https://imprintnews.org/top-stories/with-new-executive-order-trump-thrusts-foster-care-into-national-spotlight/268739

    45 min

  7. NOV 10

    The History of Closing Youth Prisons, with Nell Bernstein

    On today’s episode we discuss some of the recent Imprint reporting on how the federal shutdown is impacting youth and family programs like food stamps and Head Start, and one state where the shutdown has prompted gatekeeping of child welfare services. We also review the child welfare priorities hinted at in a  Journalist and author Nell Bernstein joins to discuss her new book In Our Future We Are Free: The Dismantling of the Youth Prison. We talked about her goals for the book, what the main drivers of progress have been, and more.  Nell Bernstein is a journalist and author. She is a former Soros Justice Media Fellow, a winner of a White House Champion of Change award. Reading Room Families Head to Food Pantries as Congress, Courts and White House Spar Over SNAP Benefits https://bit.ly/43mH19z Families Head to Food Pantries as Congress, Courts and White House Spar Over SNAP Benefits https://bit.ly/4opN7ye ‘Unimaginable Hardship’ Ahead for Children and Families if Shutdown Continues https://imprintnews.org/law-policy/hardship-ahead-for-children-and-families-if-shutdown-continues/268292 ‘Our Children’s Development Can’t Wait For Washington’s Dysfunction’ — Georgia Head Start Programs Among Hardest Hit in the Nation https://bit.ly/4qWbwgI Federal Shutdown Prompts Georgia To Gatekeep Vital Child Welfare Services https://imprintnews.org/top-stories/georgia-child-welfare-shutdown/268521 Trump’s Child Welfare Leader Vows to Protect Benefits Paid to Foster Youth https://imprintnews.org/youth-services-insider/adams-vows-curb-abusive-practice-foster-youth-benefits/268451 Trump Appointee Demands States Roll Back Foster Parenting Rules That Aim to Protect LGBTQ+ Youth https://bit.ly/485ipoj Imprint articles by Nell Bernstein https://imprintnews.org/author/nell-bernstein Nell Bernstein’s Substack https://nellbernstein.substack.com/ In Our Future We Are Free https://thenewpress.org/books/in-our-future-we-are-free/?v=eb65bcceaa5f

    51 min

  8. NOV 4

    Remembering Latonia Rolbiecki

    Latonia Rolbiecki, a Minnesota mother of three, died last month at the age of 48. Several years ago, Rolbiecki was the subject of an Imprint series about her fight to adopt her grandson after he was taken into foster care at birth.  Rolbiecki lost that legal battle, and her grandson was adopted by non-relative foster parents.  On this week’s episode we reflect back on the series, “Latonia vs. Chisago County,” and what her experience reflects about the child welfare system.  We also talk to Grace Yung Foster, founder and CEO of The Inclusion Initiative, about her organization’s upcoming leadership summit for people who have experienced foster care or adoption.  Grace Yung Foster founded The Inclusion Initiative in 2023. Before that she served as a fundraising consultant and as senior director of development for Vote.org. Reading Room Trump, Kids and Families: Register for Free https://us02web.zoom.us/webinar/register/WN_jEyQQz_3R4Giv3J_LkZS5w#/registration Latonia vs. Chisago County https://imprintnews.org/special-series/latonia-chisago-county Fighting for Kin https://imprintnews.org/special-series/fighting-for-kin Nana Kept Her Grandkids out of Foster Care. Then the Foreclosure Notice Arrived. https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation/2025/10/30/caring-for-kin-grandma-raising-grandkids-kinship-foreclosure-texas-child-welfare/86503749007/

    41 min
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About

The Imprint Weekly Podcast offers listeners a regular review of news and trends in America's child welfare and juvenile justice systems, along with other critical services for youth and families. Join Imprint Senior Editor John Kelly for a discussion of the week's major headlines, plus interviews with leaders in the field.

Information

  • Creator
    The Imprint
  • Years Active
    2020 - 2025
  • Episodes
    256
  • Rating
    Clean
  • Copyright
    © 2025 The Imprint Weekly
  • Show Website
    The Imprint Weekly

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