What is the National Prevention Learning Collaborative?
During the PSY National Symposium in Baltimore, a session on bold prevention strategies from local and national leaders featured (from left) Bree Torres, Lifeworks; Christina Miller, Conrad N. Hilton Foundation; Lauren Gamelin VanKeulen, AYA Youth Collective; and Eyan Johnson, Youth Empowered Society.
The National Prevention Learning Collaborative (NPLC) is an initiative that unites national leaders, local providers, and young people with lived experience to drive bold, data-informed strategies that prevent youth homelessness before it starts. Together, we tackle housing stability, education, employment, well-being, health care, and more—sharing real-world solutions that work.
Through webinars, briefs, and spaces for collaboration, NPLC sparks innovation, fuels investment in lasting change, and equips every partner with the tools to keep young people housed and thriving.
The Importance of Family Preservation & Strengthening Families in Preventing Youth Homelessness
December 10 ⋅ 3:00pm ET
UPCOMING WEBINAR
Youth experiencing homelessness and/ or at risk of experiencing homelessness have consistently mentioned family conflict as the primary reason for their experiencing homelessness more than their peers. Caregivers, families, and chosen families play an important role in supporting young people’s sense of safety, stability, and belonging. Join the staff at Cocoon House in Washington State, Sasha Bruce in D.C., and Waypoint in New Hampshire for a National Prevention Learning Collaborative (NPLC) webinar on how these three different community-based organizations collaborate with young people and their caregivers to provide them with supportive programming, skills and resources in strengthening their relationships as a family unit.
This session will highlight the programming that each organization provides families to prevent youth homelessness including conflict resolution, family strengthening strategies, individual and group counseling, family-centered case management, financial support and many more.
Missed a Webinar?
Watch previous webinars to catch up on insights from our community of change-makers.
Preventing Youth Homelessness Before Entry Into the Criminal Legal System
Youth who encounter the criminal legal system often face heightened risks of homelessness, especially young people of color and LGBTQ+ youth.
This webinar highlights innovative cross-sector collaborations that connect diversion, reentry, and housing supports to keep young people housed and thriving.
Strengthening State Laws to Prevent Youth Homelessness
This session highlights key legislative strategies that strengthen coordination across systems, promote early intervention, and protect young people’s rights. Attendees will gain practical insights and examples to inform advocacy and policy-making efforts that stop youth homelessness before it starts.
Schools play a critical role in identifying risks early and supporting students before they experience homelessness. This webinar will highlight strategies for partnering with schools to strengthen prevention efforts, featuring insights from the National Center for Youth Law and practitioners from the Monterey Peninsula Unified School District. Join us to learn how communities can work together to create supportive pathways that keep young people stably housed and connected to opportunity.
Engaging Schools in Upstream Prevention
Leveraging Lived expertise to Inform Policies and Practices to Prevent Youth Homelessness
This session spotlights groundbreaking research that centers the lived expertise of nearly 450 youth partners — including LGBTQ+ youth of color, young parents, and Indigenous, Latinx, and immigrant youth. Together, they co-designed research methods, shaped the analysis, and lifted up recommendations to strengthen prevention policies and programs.
Hear directly from the study’s co-leaders on:
- How lived expertise reshaped the research process
- Key findings on prevention strategies for highly marginalized youth
- Recommendations to inform future policies and practices
Building Sustainable Futures:
Hiring Youth into Meaningful Workplaces
Youth employment can be a powerful prevention strategy, but creating pathways to sustainable, supportive workplaces requires intentional design. In this session, two providers will share how their organizations are hiring young people, what they have learned along the way, and how these practices contribute to stronger outcomes for both youth and employers. Following these provider perspectives, participants will move into small group conversations to exchange experiences, surface challenges, and explore strategies for building workplace environments where young people can thrive and grow.
Preventing Homelessness with Youth Who Are Court Involved
In this National Prevention Learning Collaborative (NPLC) webinar, representatives from the Seattle YMCA and Legal Counsel for Youth and Children share how these initiatives provide early intervention, housing support, and legal advocacy to reduce system involvement and improve long-term outcomes for young people.
The discussion highlights the critical role of targeted, collaborative efforts in preventing youth homelessness by addressing housing instability at key moments of vulnerability.
NPLC Webinar: The Youth Compensation Legal Guide
This webinar breaks down the basics: labor laws, contracting, taxes, public benefits, and more. We’ll share practical tips, best practices, and real-world cautionary tales to help your organization avoid the common pitfalls that can lead to harm and broken trust. If you're working with—or planning to work with—young people in paid roles, you don’t want to miss this.
Pathways to Success: How Colorado is Implementing a Statewide Case Management
This webinar featured the Pathways to Success model, an innovative intervention co-designed with young people to prevent homelessness among youth aging out of care in Colorado.The webinar gives an inside look at how the model was developed, tested through formative evaluation, and refined based on real-world outcomes.
A Data Sharing Success Story: Colorado’s Prevalence of Youth Homelessness Study
This webinar explores a new approach to generating more accurate counts of youth experiencing homelessness in Colorado by using multi-year administrative data from multiple agencies. It also highlights the importance of youth voice in shaping the research and includes insights from service providers and state partners on the challenges and benefits of data sharing and collaboration.
Flexible Cash Assistance Models
Learn more about the first National Prevention Learning Collaborative (NPLC) webinar on Flexible Cash Assistance (FCA) Models for Youth Homelessness Prevention! Check out how Point Source Youth, Valley Youth House, Covenant House Alaska, and Sasha Bruce Youthwork successfully used Flexible Cash Assistance to prevent youth homelessness.
NPLC Webinar Calendar
Preview upcoming and past NPLC webinars to stay up to date.
“Half of the adults who experience homelessness experience it first as a young person. If we want to end homelessness for people in our communities, we need to ensure young people never experience it in the first place.”
— Tricia Raikes, co-founder of The Raikes Foundation
