Podcast | It’s a Youth Today News takeover

The third episode of the investigative series co-produced with Crosscut focuses on one woman’s experience with foster care and homelessness in WA.

Janell Braxton portrait

Janell Braxton, photographed here outside the apartment building she has lived in for four years, grew up in and out of the foster system and is now working to help other youth aging out of the system. “Figuring out who you are as a young person is hard. And to have to figure it out while you’re transitioning or moving or going through all these things is even harder,” Janell said. “I kind of lost who I was.” (Genna Martin/Crosscut)

A few months ago, Crosscut collaborated with the nonprofit organization Youth Today to produce a three-part multimedia series on youth homelessness.  

Reporter Elizabeth Whitman and producer Sam Leeds investigated several pilot programs designed to support young people who’ve been involved in state systems such as foster care or juvenile justice.  


Subscribe to Crosscut Reports on Apple PodcastsSpotifyGoogle Podcasts, or Podbean.


This week we’re dropping one of those episodes into the Crosscut Reports feed. It features Janell Braxton, a woman who is still reckoning with her experience in Washington’s foster care system.  

Listen here, then follow Youth Today News wherever you get your podcasts. 

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