A Typology of Transition-Age Youth

Young adulthood is a time of transition which poses particular challenges for youth who are homeless or at risk of homelessness, including those exiting foster care. The instability of being homeless puts youth at greater risk of many poor outcomes. Connection to relevant housing resources and services are critical to ensure that young adults have the opportunity to succeed. Better aligning youths’ needs with relevant housing resources can help young adults become and remain stably housed, leading to better lifetime outcomes. This study presents a typology of young adults who exit foster care and residential programs for homeless young adults, including emergency shelters and transitional living programs. The study uses administrative data to follow a cohort of 8,795 young adults, including young parents and unaccompanied young adults from ages 18 through 21, who exited foster care or homeless services. Using sequence analysis, subsequent service use after exit, including utilization of homeless services, hospitals, jail, subsidized housing, and supportive housing, was used to build three-year trajectories of service use patterns of youth. These patterns were then grouped together based on similarity using cluster analysis to form six distinct groups of youth: (1) Minimal Service Use, (2) Later Homeless Experience, (3) Earlier Homeless Experience, (4) Consistent Subsidized Housing, (5) Consistent Supportive Housing, and (6) Frequent Jail Stays. Profiles were developed for each typology to comprehensively, but concisely, describe differences in the characteristics of each group of youth. Models were also developed to determine factors that were predictive of each typology. This typology is being used to inform prioritization processes for housing resources and to better understand how to target programs based on potential pathways of youth

A Typology of Transition-Age Youth

Young adulthood is a time of transition which poses particular challenges for youth who are homeless or at risk of homelessness, including those exiting foster care. The instability of being homeless puts youth at greater risk of many poor outcomes. Connection to relevant housing resources and services are critical to ensure that young adults have the opportunity to succeed. Better aligning youths’ needs with relevant housing resources can help young adults become and remain stably housed, leading to better lifetime outcomes. This study presents a typology of young adults who exit foster care and residential programs for homeless young adults, including emergency shelters and transitional living programs. The study uses administrative data to follow a cohort of 8,795 young adults, including young parents and unaccompanied young adults from ages 18 through 21, who exited foster care or homeless services. Using sequence analysis, subsequent service use after exit, including utilization of homeless services, hospitals, jail, subsidized housing, and supportive housing,  was used to build three-year trajectories of service use patterns of youth. These patterns were then grouped together based on similarity using cluster analysis to form six distinct groups of youth: (1) Minimal Service Use, (2) Later Homeless Experience, (3) Earlier Homeless Experience, (4) Consistent Subsidized Housing, (5) Consistent Supportive Housing, and (6) Frequent Jail Stays. Profiles were developed for each typology to comprehensively, but concisely, describe differences in the characteristics of each group of youth. Models were also developed to determine factors that were predictive of each typology. This typology is being used to inform prioritization processes for housing resources and to better understand how to target programs based on potential pathways of youth

The Emerging Crisis of Aged Homelessness

This report summarizes a multi-site study in three localities - Boston, New York City, and Los Angeles County - of the anticipated future of the aged homeless population, its likely impacts on health and shelter systems and resulting costs, and the potential for housing solutions. Specifically, this report summarizes the following analyses:Forecasts of the size of the aged homeless population to 2030Projected costs associated with the use of shelter, health care, and long-term care by this aged homeless populationSegmentation of the forecasted aged population based on the intensity of health and shelter use by various subgroupsPotential service cost reductions associated with housing interventions based on scenarios from prior literatureThe net cost of the proposed housing interventions based on the potential for shelter, health, and nursing home cost offsetsThe report concludes with some considerations regarding how to pay for potential housing solutions, given the complexity of the various funding streams. Absent new housing solutions, substantial public resources will otherwise be spent unnecessarily on excess shelter, health, and long-term care use.Click "Download" to access this resource

mNCEA policy brief - Mind the Gap – The need to continue long-term plankton monitoring

This policy brief argues that while it is beneficial to explore novel plankton survey technology, it is essential that we also continue to maintain traditional long-term monitoring programmes to generate the necessary information to inform policy. Changes in plankton have important implications for the continued provision of ecosystem services, including supporting commercial fish stocks, carbon sequestration, and oxygen production. Such changes can only be detected by studying long-term, consistent plankton datasets which are needed to understand the pressures driving these changes and how we can manage them. Traditional long-term plankton monitoring relies on light microscopy to identify and count plankton taxa, with methods fully supported by national / international QA/QC standards and providing high quality trusted data. Novel technologies, including imaging and molecular methods, offer more efficient means of collecting some types of plankton data, filling targeted knowledge gaps left by traditional monitoring. However, these data are often semi-quantitative, lacking in QA/QC standards, and/or in taxonomic resolution. While these technologies are developed it remains critical to maintain the continuity of traditional plankton monitoring to inform policy assessments of important changes in biodiversity. Losing these time-series, many of which span multiple decades, would impair our ability to detect important change in pelagic habitats, as most changes cannot be detected from short-term data. This would also accelerate the loss of taxonomic expertise, already under threat globally, diminishing our UK skill-base. Novel technologies should be explored in parallel to traditional monitoring, as they can provide complementary data to support policy assessments and research, however, it is important that we do not attempt to replace traditional monitoring with new technology before it has been thoroughly integrated into long-term monitoring programmes. This project was funded by the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Defra) as part of the marine arm of the Natural Capital and Ecosystem Assessment (NCEA) programme. The marine NCEA programme is leading the way in supporting Government ambition to integrate natural capital approaches into decision making for the marine environment. Find out more at https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/natural-capital-and-ecosystem-assessment-programme

Lifeform indicators reveal large-scale shifts in plankton across the North-West European shelf

Increasing direct human pressures on the marine environment, coupled with climate-driven changes, is a concern to marine ecosystems globally. This requires the development and monitoring of ecosystem indicators for effective management and adaptation planning. Plankton lifeforms (broad functional groups) are sensitive indicators of marine environmental change and can provide a simplified view of plankton biodiversity, building an understanding of change in lower trophic levels. Here, we visualize regional-scale multi-decadal trends in six key plankton lifeforms as well as their correlative relationships with sea surface temperature (SST). For the first time, we collate trends across multiple disparate surveys, comparing the spatially and temporally extensive Continuous Plankton Recorder (CPR) survey (offshore) with multiple long-term fixed station-based time-series (inshore) from around the UK coastline. These analyses of plankton lifeforms showed profound long-term changes, which were coherent across large spatial scales. For example, ‘diatom’ and ‘meroplankton’ lifeforms showed strong alignment between surveys and coherent regional-scale trends, with the 1998–2017 decadal average abundance of meroplankton being 2.3 times that of 1958–1967 for CPR samples in the North Sea. This major, shelf-wide increase in meroplankton correlated with increasing SSTs, and contrasted with a general decrease in holoplankton (dominated by small copepods), indicating a changing balance of benthic and pelagic fauna. Likewise, inshore-offshore gradients in dinoflagellate trends, with contemporary increases inshore contrasting with multi-decadal decreases offshore (approx. 75% lower decadal mean abundance), urgently require the identification of causal mechanisms. Our lifeform approach allows the collation of many different data types and time-series across the NW European shelf, providing a crucial evidence base for informing ecosystem-based management, and the development of regional adaptation plans

The Plankton Lifeform Extraction Tool: a digital tool to increase the discoverability and usability of plankton time-series data

Publication history: Accepted - 25 October 2021; Published online - 6 December 2021.Plankton form the base of the marine food web and are sensitive indicators of environmental change. Plankton time series are therefore an essential part of monitoring progress towards global biodiversity goals, such as the Convention on Biological Diversity Aichi Targets, and for informing ecosystem-based policy, such as the EU Marine Strategy Framework Directive. Multiple plankton monitoring programmes exist in Europe, but differences in sampling and analysis methods prevent the integration of their data, constraining their utility over large spatio-temporal scales. The Plankton Lifeform Extraction Tool brings together disparate European plankton datasets into a central database from which it extracts abundance time series of plankton functional groups, called “lifeforms”, according to shared biological traits. This tool has been designed to make complex plankton datasets accessible and meaningful for policy, public interest, and scientific discovery. It allows examination of large-scale shifts in lifeform abundance or distribution (for example, holoplankton being partially replaced by meroplankton), providing clues to how the marine environment is changing. The lifeform method enables datasets with different plankton sampling and taxonomic analysis methodologies to be used together to provide insights into the response to multiple stressors and robust policy evidence for decision making. Lifeform time series generated with the Plankton Lifeform Extraction Tool currently inform plankton and food web indicators for the UK's Marine Strategy, the EU's Marine Strategy Framework Directive, and for the Convention for the Protection of the Marine Environment of the North-East Atlantic (OSPAR) biodiversity assessments. The Plankton Lifeform Extraction Tool currently integrates 155 000 samples, containing over 44 million plankton records, from nine different plankton datasets within UK and European seas, collected between 1924 and 2017. Additional datasets can be added, and time series can be updated. The Plankton Lifeform Extraction Tool is hosted by The Archive for Marine Species and Habitats Data (DASSH) at https://www.dassh.ac.uk/lifeforms/ (last access: 22 November 2021, Ostle et al., 2021). The lifeform outputs are linked to specific, DOI-ed, versions of the Plankton Lifeform Traits Master List and each underlying dataset.Funding that supports this work and the data collected has come from the European Commission, European Union (EU) grant no. 11.0661/2015/712630/SUB/ENVC.2 OSPAR; UK Natural Environment Research Council (grant nos. NE/R002738/1 and NE/M007855/1); EMFF, Climate Linked Atlantic Sector Science (grant no. NE/R015953/1), Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, UK Government (grant nos. ME-5308 and ME-414135), NSF USA OCE-1657887, DFO CA F5955150026/001/HAL, Natural Environment Research Council UK (grant no. NC-R8/H12/100); Horizon 2020 (MISSION ATLANTIC (grant no. 862428)); iCPR (grant no. SBFF-2019-36526), IMR Norway; DTU Aqua Denmark; and the French Ministry of Environment, Energy, and the Sea (MEEM). Recent funding for the development of PLET and the Pelagic Habitats Indicator has been provided by HBDSEG/Defra and MMO/EMFF. The MSS Scottish Coastal Observatory data and analyses are funded and maintained by the Scottish Government Schedules of Service (grant nos. ST05a and ST02H), MSS Stonehaven Samplers, North Atlantic Fisheries College, Shetland, Orkney Islands Harbour Council, and Isle Ewe Shellfish

The James Webb Space Telescope Mission

Twenty-six years ago a small committee report, building on earlier studies, expounded a compelling and poetic vision for the future of astronomy, calling for an infrared-optimized space telescope with an aperture of at least $4m$. With the support of their governments in the US, Europe, and Canada, 20,000 people realized that vision as the $6.5m$ James Webb Space Telescope. A generation of astronomers will celebrate their accomplishments for the life of the mission, potentially as long as 20 years, and beyond. This report and the scientific discoveries that follow are extended thank-you notes to the 20,000 team members. The telescope is working perfectly, with much better image quality than expected. In this and accompanying papers, we give a brief history, describe the observatory, outline its objectives and current observing program, and discuss the inventions and people who made it possible. We cite detailed reports on the design and the measured performance on orbit.Comment: Accepted by PASP for the special issue on The James Webb Space Telescope Overview, 29 pages, 4 figure