• Away From Home: Youth Experiences of Institutional Placement in Foster Case – Since the creation of the modern child welfare system, child welfare has sent a percentage of youth in foster care to live in institutional placements, not with relatives or foster families. Of the hundreds of thousands of young people in foster care systems each year, over 43,823 (AFCARS, 2020), or 10%, are in group homes or institutional placements, but in some states, that number is much higher, topping over 30% (Children’s Bureau, 2015).