A Thanksgiving Home for Ohio's Foster Youth

A Thanksgiving Home for Ohio's Foster Youth

Public News Service - OH
November 21, 2014

COLUMBUS, Ohio - While many families are able to gather to enjoy the upcoming holidays, this time of year for foster youth can be a reminder of what's been missing from their lives. An annual series of Early Thanksgiving Dinners offers a chance for these children and foster alumni in Ohio to gather and feel welcome.

As a foster child for 10 years, Dylan McIntosh of Cleveland said he lived in 23 different homes. He said these regional dinners are places of peace and comfort for foster kids.

"They don't have the normal resources that a child or teenager with parents that love and care about them has," he said. "There's no financial backing, there's no place to go home for the holidays; there's no one you can run to for love and support when you need it. They're at a disadvantage."

Hundreds of teens "age out" out of the foster-care system in Ohio each year, and McIntosh said they need financial, social and emotional supports to help them lead successful lives.

The Ohio Youth Advisory Board, Ohio Reach and Connecting the Dots are among the programs helping these foster teens transition into adulthood.

Laquita Howell of Cincinnati attended the dinners as a former foster child, and now helps get others involved. She said she's made lifelong friendships with others who have helped her along the way.

"I've had a connection with one of our local foster-caring services and I got a job with them," she said. "It was really nice to see that they not only bring their youth to the Thanksgiving dinner - that they come, and they promote it, so that other kids don't feel left out."

Meanwhile, Saturday is National Adoption Day, which McIntosh said highlights the need to ensure that more Ohio foster children can find permanent homes.

"Foster children are more deserving than they let on, they're more loving than they let on, and they're no different from any other child - they just don't have as much as a normal person, growing up with a family," he said. "They're just left to gamble with it, and hope that the government does it right."

The Ohio chapter of Foster Care Alumni of America hosts the dinners. The next is Sunday in Reynoldsburg. Information about the events is online at thanksgivingtogether.wikspaces.com.

Congratulations to Lighthouse Youth Services

Youth at Risk of Homelessness Federal Planning Grant

Congratulations to Lighthouse Youth Services in Cincinnati for receiving a two-year, $360,000-a-year planning grant from the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services to develop strategies to prevent homelessness among youth aging out of foster care. OFC, the Hamilton County Department of Job and Family Services and the University of Cincinnati’s Institute for Policy Research are partnering with Lighthouse in this project. 

In addition, Lighthouse has formed a steering committee that includes Cincinnati Public Schools, Hamilton County Juvenile Court, the Hamilton County Mental Health and Recovery Services Board, the Lighthouse Youth Advisory Board, the Partnership Center, the Southwest Ohio Region Workforce Investment Board and the nonprofit organization Strategies to End Homelessness.

Lighthouse launched the project last month with a community forum that featured a discussion with Ohio Rep. Teresa Fedor, who discussed the connection between homeless youth and human trafficking. The goal of the project is to improve outcomes for at-risk youth in four key areas: social and emotional well-being, stable housing, permanent connections, and education and job readiness.

Hooray for Mariah Maxwell and Markeema McMillan -- great job!!

Foster youths in Hamilton County honored for academic success with scholarships from HEMI Mirones, Tony. WCPO Cincinnati, Dec 12, 2013.

CINCINNATI -- Markeema McMillan is doing something people have doubted she’d be able to do her entire life. She’s succeeding.

McMillan is a foster youth and a byproduct of the Hamilton County foster care system. Despite the best efforts of the employees and workers of the county system, foster youths often struggle through the education system.

National statistics for foster children who turn 18 and "age out" of the system are not encouraging. According to the Pew Commission on Children in Foster Care report (2004):

• 58 percent complete high school compared to 87 percent of the general population 
• 3 percent earn college degrees compared to 28 percent of the general population 
• 25 percent are incarcerated within the first two years of "aging out" 
• 20 percent become homeless 

"People didn't believe in me, they told me I wouldn't graduate from high school," said McMillan, a student at the University of Cincinnati.

Refusing to become victims and to societal expectations, McMillan and several of her peers have benefited from the resources provided by the Higher Education Mentoring Initiative, or HEMI. The organization works to “affect positive change as … students continue on the path to adulthood” by encouraging foster youth to pursue post-secondary education through mentoring.

Within weeks of Hamilton County Commissioner Greg Hartmann taking office in January 2009, he worked with Hamilton County Job and Family Services to design and implement the HEMI program. The group works with people like McMillan who’ve aged out of the Hamilton County Foster Care system.

“By pairing foster youth with mentors, HEMI is improving the safety net available to these students after they turn 18 and emancipate from the county’s care,” said Moira Weir, director of Hamilton County Job and Family Services and a founding partner of HEMI.

HEMI mentors volunteer to serve as long-term educational consultants and are committed to providing support for youth throughout their high school education and beyond.

Mentors take on duties such as helping students with homework, guide them through making educational decisions and generally encouraging the students to work toward their educational goals. They also help them with tasks such as finding housing.

Mentor Kelly Winters says it’s imperative to support foster youths who have unique challenges that put them at a disadvantage against many of their peers.

"They're on their own and they've got all the adult responsibilities too so it's really a challenge for them. And any support we can give them will help them,” Winters said.

McMillan said her time working with the people at HEMI has helped boost her self-esteem and made her believe earning a college degree is a possibility. "(Being a foster youth) made me have low self-esteem, but now I look at it as motivation," McMillan said.

Each of the 45 participants have graduated from high school. That’s a 100 percent success rate since it started in 2009. Most have gone on to pursue some form of higher education, according to HEMI officials.

One of the organization's early success stories is Mariah Maxwell. She was HEMI’s first college graduate. In fact, she earned two degrees in three years. Now Maxwell working toward her Master’s degree in Criminal Justice at the University of Cincinnati. 

In addition to her individual successes, Maxwell serves as an inspiration to many foster youths. Seeing what Maxwell has accomplished inspired McMillan and other young people in the program to believe they can do great things as well.

"I tell myself every morning that I can do it and I have a purpose," said McMillan who credits much of her positive outlook to HEMI and its staff.

While McMillan is the first to thank HEMI for all its given to her, the organization wants to give something back as a way to congratulate her for all she has accomplished. Thursday night, McMillian will be honored with a $20,000 academic scholarship at the HEMI Holiday and Scholarship Dinner. She’s one of 11 recipients of the award. 

In total, five high school seniors and six students currently enrolled in post-secondary institutions will receive the scholarships will take place at 6 p.m. at the Kingsgate Marriott Conference Center. Scholarship awards will be presented to recipients at 7:20 p.m.

“These scholarships are another tool to help further HEMI’s mission of encouraging and supporting foster youth in their pursuit of a college degree or job training,” said Hartmann.

Hartmann raised the money for the scholarships privately through the annual HEMI “Run for the Roses” Kentucky Derby fundraiser. Funds also came through a grant by AT and T.

McMillan is grateful for the scholarship and all the help she has received. But she doesn't want to stop at gratitude. McMillan says she wants to use the opportunity HEMI is providing her to better the lives of other people. She plans to be a social worker when she graduates.

"I know what it's like to not have help. It just makes me feel good when I help people. It's my passion, I just feel like it comes naturally," McMillan said.

OHIO YAB President Allissa Mitchell in the news

Kids want foster-care support to age 21

Price, Rita. Columbus Dispatch, Jan. 30, 2014.

With more than a year to go until she turns 18, Allissa Mitchell hopes she’ll be reunited with her family before that milestone birthday.

But dreams don’t always come true. So just in case, Mitchell — a 16-year-old living in foster care — is pushing for a guarantee that she won’t be alone and on her own as soon as she becomes an adult.

“We really need that leeway,” said Mitchell, who attended a gathering yesterday of advocates who want Ohio to join the growing number of states that offer the option of foster-care support to age 21.

Foster youths who age out of the system at 18 often are ill-prepared and overwhelmed. One widely cited study showed that more than 1 in 5 becomes homeless, 1 in 4 becomes involved in the justice system within two years, and about 70 percent of the young women are pregnant by 21. 

“These aren’t just numbers,” Mitchell said. “These are lives. Actual lives.”

Mitchell is president of the Overcoming Hurdles in Ohio Youth Advisory Board, an advocacy organization of young people who have experienced foster care.

Lisa Dickson, an adult supporter for the board, said members discussed the possibility of extended care during their retreat this month. Their views surprised her.

“As a former foster youth who aged out in the 1980s, I assumed that youth wouldn’t be interested” in possible care to age 21, Dickson said. “I was wrong.”

Mitchell, a Stark County resident, said the proposal is overwhelmingly popular among young people.

“Who, realistically, has a job that they can live on at that age?” asked Marjory Curry, 26. She aged out of foster care at 18, went to college and received some ongoing support from Lucas County that made a big difference.

Resources for post-emancipation programs and support vary by county. “I do feel like I’m standing on the shoulders of a lot of people,” Curry said. “I didn’t make it by myself.”

Between 1,000 and 1,300 Ohio foster youths age out of the system each year when they turn 18, said Mark Mecum, executive director of the Ohio Association of Child Caring Agencies.

Mecum said advocates want the state to pay the local tab for foster youths who opt to remain in the system after age 18. About two-thirds of foster-care costs are paid by the federal government. Alvin Mares, an Ohio State University professor, is developing a cost estimate and a cost-benefit analysis to show whether the expansion would save the state money through reduced spending on welfare, incarceration, health care and other needs.

The Fostering Connections Act of 2008 allows states to use federal foster-care money for eligible youths up to age 21, rather than 18. About 25 states plus the District of Columbia now have such programs in place or pending.

Most have extended foster care to 21 through legislation rather than administrative rule so that it becomes a mandate, Mecum said. The federal government would have final approval of the plan.

Too often, it comes down to a question of money

Editorial: Some foster kids need more time
Columbus Dispatch, January 13, 2014.

For years, advocates for Ohio’s kids in foster care have warned that those who “age out” — whose birth families never come back together, and who find themselves on their own and unprepared at 18 — are at high risk of becoming homeless, getting (or getting someone) pregnant, falling in with criminals and otherwise seeing their lives derailed before they begin.

A solution offered by a group of agencies — extending foster care to age 21 — could make sense, if it is designed to prepare those young adults for adult responsibility.

Simply extending the time they’re given meals, supervision and a roof over their heads won’t make them better prepared. An extension of foster care should include direct instruction — what some groups call an independent-living curriculum — in life-survival basics.

More-fortunate children go to the protected world of college for four years; others can linger at home longer while they try to turn an entry-level job into a career they can live on. For most people, that doesn’t happen overnight. Imagine the challenge faced by an 18-year-old, suddenly expected to support herself, with no parents’ house to retreat to. Throw in the aftereffects of a traumatic childhood and the likelihood of failure is plain. 

Give foster teens the type of post-high-school safety net that others have, on the other hand, and they’d have a better shot at success in college or a job.

Twenty-five states, plus the District of Columbia, have such programs.

A 2008 federal law provides some funding for the extension, but states and local communities have to pay some of the cost, too.

A group called the Ohio Fostering Connections Task Force is pushing for the idea. Because local child-welfare funding varies greatly from county to county, it plans to ask the state to support a uniform program statewide. 

Mark Mecum, executive director of the Ohio Association of Child Caring Agencies, believes buffering foster teens against failure easily would pay for itself, by turning dependence into independence.

One option to consider, favored by foster-care advocates, is to give 18-year-olds options. If they, as many 18-year-olds, want to try living on their own, they can do so, but also retain the option to return to foster care, up to age 21, if they stumble. 

California has created a special foster-care license for volunteers expressly interested in helping 18-to-21-year-olds. The program refers to them as “teaching homes.”

Those fortunate enough to be born into stable and loving families all come from “teaching homes”; they can learn gradually to fly on their own, and have Mom and/or Dad to turn to in times of trouble. Parents who ruefully but lovingly joke about “failure to launch” — adult children who keep coming back — know all about that.

Extended foster care, like regular foster care, never can equal a nurturing family from birth. But for a young person without that blessing, a well-designed program, offering some growing-up lessons and a chance to fail without catastrophe, could improve lives immeasurably.

Ohio hoping to extend foster care supports for youth between ages 18-21

Foster care until age 21 has backers

Price, Rita. Columbus Dispatch. Jan. 6, 2014

A group of child-welfare advocates is launching a campaign to get Ohio to join the growing number of states that extend foster care to age 21.

Between 1,000 and 1,300 Ohio foster youths age out of the system each year when they turn 18, and too many exit to a bleak landscape with scant resources and support, said Mark Mecum, executive director of the Ohio Association of Child Caring Agencies.

Homelessness, crime and early parenthood are common experiences. Success in college and on the job is often elusive.

“Investing in this population by extending supports brings forth all sorts of benefits to society,” Mecum said. “Those benefits far outweigh the costs.”

 He said that 25 states plus the District of Columbia have programs to stretch foster care to age 21 for youths who want to keep services as they work toward independence.

 “All the states that are as big as Ohio already have done this,” Mecum said.

 The Fostering Connections Act of 2008 allows states to use federal foster-care money for eligible youths up to age 21, rather than 18.

 State and local governments, however, still pay a share of the cost.

And in Ohio, with a county-based system of 88 public child-welfare agencies, budgets vary widely. Some county agencies, such as Franklin’s, are resource-rich and receive money from property-tax levies. Others, especially in rural areas, are pressed.

 Mecum said the Ohio Fostering Connections task force plans to ask the state — and not the individual counties — to pay the local tab for foster youths who remain in care after age 18.

“Part of our research will be showing the cost benefit to doing this in Ohio,” he said.

Mecum said the group, which is meeting later this month, is contracting with an Ohio State University professor to develop a cost estimate.

Chip Spinning, executive director of Franklin County Children Services, said the agency is interested in the idea. “We realize that many of our kids in our system, and even in the general population, are not ready to make it on their own in the adult world at that age,” he said.

 But extending the age limit won’t be as beneficial as advocates hope unless the extra years of care are designed to prepare the youths for independence, said Crystal Allen, executive director of the Public Children Services Association of Ohio. Without program improvements, some experts agree, foster-care extensions may only delay homelessness instead of prevent it.

“Just doing more of the same isn’t sufficient,” said Amy Dworsky, a senior researcher at Chapin Hall, a child and family research center at the University of Chicago. “You need to provide them with the kind of housing options and experiences that are going to help them.” 

Dworsky said extended foster care already is making a difference in high-school and post-secondary education. She thinks that re-entry provisions also are important, so that foster teens who decide not to continue care after turning 18 have a chance to change their minds.

In states where care extends to age 21, most foster teens opt to stay. “I think the youth know a good thing when they see it,” Dworsky said.

Mecum said the task force wants to make clear the struggle that many foster youths face. “These kids are more likely to be homeless than other kids, and new information from the state of Ohio shows that they’re also likely to be targets of human trafficking,” he said.

Ohio needs better oversight of psychotropic medication and foster children

Ohio Medicaid data document rising polypharmacy in foster children
Miller, Naseem S., Family Practice News. Children and Adolescent Medicine.

Prescribing of three or more psychotropic medications has increased among foster children enrolled in Medicaid, based on an analysis of claims data in Ohio. The findings of polypharmacy are raising red flags about oversight and monitoring of psychotropic medication use among high-risk youth.

By 2008, nearly a quarter of foster care and disabled children in the Ohio Medicaid program were prescribed three or more psychiatric medications. Nearly one-fifth of them were prescribed medications from three or more drug classes, with the most common combination being stimulants, antipsychotics, and alpha-agonists.

The findings make a powerful case for system-wide oversight and monitoring of psychotropic prescribing practices in the Medicaid population, especially for children in foster care, said Cynthia A. Fontanella, Ph.D., of the Ohio State University, Columbus, who led the study and presented her findings at the annual meeting of the American Academy of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry. "We don’t know if these kids are doing better ... The increase has "occurred despite lack of data on safety and efficacy of multiple drug combination and existing concerns about adverse effects of drug-drug interactions."

A 2012 report by the Government Accountability Office that showed 18% of foster children were taking psychotropic medications. That report additionally noted, however, that 30% of the children who may have needed mental health services hadn't received them. The rising rates of polypharmacy, especially in children enrolled in Medicaid, have been documented in other studies.

But the accumulating data implies polypharmacy is pervasive in at-risk children. "It’s a growing trend," said Susan dosReis, Ph.D., associate professor at the University of Maryland School of Pharmacy, Baltimore, who has studied psychiatric prescription patterns among youth. She was not involved in the study. Dr. dosReis acknowledged that the issue is complex, especially in the cases of children with severe conditions. Clinicians face families who are looking for a way to manage their child or to keep them in school. "And once you have a child on a combination, and there’s improvement, the thought of taking away the medications is hard to accept, because [the family is] afraid that the condition will worsen again."

Prescribing multiple psychotropic medications has increased among foster children enrolled in Medicaid, with accumulating data implying polypharmacy is pervasive in at-risk children.

Also, follow-up has been problematic, with data that don’t clearly indicate whether the children were on several medications for a short period of time until they were stabilized, or the whether the polypharmacy lasted longer. Data for children enrolled in private insurance are lacking, and prescribing is difficult to track for children in foster care because they move frequently.

 Dr. Fontanella and her colleagues compared polypharmacy patterns and rates in foster care, disabled, and low-income youth aged 17 years and younger enrolled in Ohio Medicaid between 2002 (n = 26,000) and 2008 (n = 50,000). The two outcome measures — any polypharmacy (three or more medications) — and multiclass polypharmacy (three or more medications from different drug classes) increased over time across all three groups. Polypharmacy increased from 9% to 12% for low-income youth; from 18% to 25% in disabled youth; and from 20% to 27% in foster care youth.

Foster care prevention in Cuyahoga County

Cuyahoga County policy would target foster care 

Columbus Dispatch, Jan. 4, 2014

CLEVELAND (AP) — Ohio’s largest county wants to try an experimental approach to keep more children from homeless families out of foster care.

A fundraising model being floated by Cuyahoga County Executive Ed FitzGerald would give private investors a chance to make some money by helping to expand an existing intervention program, according to the Northeast Ohio Media Group.

Investors would get their money back, plus up to 2 percent interest, if the intervention program hits its performance goals.

The proposal, which is still being developed, would aim to raise between $8 million and $9 million from foundations, banks and other investors.

FitzGerald, a Democratic candidate for governor, said the program could save the county money overall if it can reduce the number of kids in foster care.

Investors’ profits would come from taxpayers, who already pay $35 million for foster care in the county of about 1.2 million residents.

The fundraising method has been called “pay for success” or “social impact bonds.” Lately, it has been attracting interest in the United States within academic, government and philanthropic circles, according to the Northeast Ohio Media Group, which includes The Plain Dealer.

David Merriman, FitzGerald’s deputy chief of staff for human services, said county administration is still developing the benchmarks that would be used to determine whether the investors get their money back.

If county officials approve the proposal, the administration hopes to get everything in place by July.

Legal Aid fellow to advocate for children in foster care and aging out of the system

Dissell, Rachel. Cleveland Plain Dealer, Jan. 3, 2014.

CLEVELAND, Ohio -- In addition to physical and emotional scars, foster children and those aging out of the system, often face a hidden host of financial, educational and legal problems that can become barriers from leading normal adult lives.

A new Legal Aid Society of Cleveland fellow aims to help some of the region's most vulnerable navigate complex legal issues foisted upon them.

Danielle Godomski-Littleton's work will be funded jointly by the Ohio Legal Assistance Foundation and Washington D.C.-based Equal Justice Works.

She aims to step in and advocate for youth whose credit has been ruined by identity fraud. She will help them stand up to landlords who may not be keeping their apartments in safe and healthy conditions. And she will help them navigate their legal rights to housing, medical and other benefits.

Colleen Cotter, executive director at Legal Aid Society, said the project fits in with the agency's mission to secure justice for those who are vulnerable.

"There is no population more vulnerable than youth in or recently aged out of foster care," Cotter said. " I believe that by engaging with these young adults we can serve as the pivot point in their lives. We can show them that they have rights and give them a voice to enforce those rights."

In so many cases, Gadomski-Littleton said, just the paperwork involved with those issues can be so overwhelming that youths give up. Sometimes that means going without insurance, or getting a utility turned on. Other times it can lead to homelessness.

Statistics kept by the Cuyahoga County Department of Children and Family Services show on average through October of this year more than 13 kids a month aged out of foster care – which amounts to more than 160 for the year.

Mary Louise Madigan, a spokeswoman for the agency, said those leaving foster care deal with the same hurdles that anyone moving into adulthood does – how to manage finances, housing and medical issues -- except with fewer supports and trustworthy adults in their lives. Sometimes they also want to just get away from the system that has raised them and are hesitant to come back and ask for help.

Gadomski-Littleton said she will get referrals from independent living workers from the county agency and other community agencies that work with children in foster care or those about to leave county care. "I hope to help them start with a more level playing field," she said.

In addition, Gadomski-Littleton will also advocate for children in foster care with special education and immigration issues.

Wish every Ohio county had a Fill This House for foster care alumni

Fill This House, Bay Village nonprofit helps former foster kids make it on their own 
Galbinicea, Barb. Cleveland Plain Dealer, Jan. 9, 2014.

BAY VILLAGE, Ohio – Adam Mays can’t believe his eyes.

“All this?” the 18-year-old asks, gesturing to the bags and boxes that pack Laura Geuther’s SUV. There’s a microwave, bedding , dishes, glasses, flatware and more. All of it is brand new.

There’s even a loaf of pumpkin bread baked by Geuther’s mother and, as with every delivery from Fill This House, a nonprofit that helps former foster children, there’s a Bible tucked into one of the bags.

Geuther is the executive director of the grassroots organization, based in Bay Village. The group this year has helped 60 young people like Mays who were in foster care and are now trying to make it on their own.

Experts say that thousands of young people “age out” of foster care systems across the country every year. There are hundreds of them in Northeast Ohio alone. Most are 18, with no family support system.

Mays, an upbeat guy with big dreams, tells Geuther after they tote all the bounty to the second floor on a recent Saturday that he had just moved in the night before to the bare apartment on Cleveland's West Side. There’s no bed, no refrigerator, no stove, not one piece of furniture. He says that after spending most of his life in and out of foster care, he moved in with only his clothes.

Geuther has heard the story before and it’s part of what motivates her and her board to intervene at “what is a pivotal moment in these kids’ lives. They’re either going to go one way or the other.” 

The household goods, valued at about $600 per delivery, are accompanied by a healthy dose of support to young people who may have had little of that over their lives.

“Stay in school,” Geuther advises during her delivery to Mays. “Keep plugging away, The rest of your life is a long time.”

Mays nods. “I’m really determined,” he says, confiding that he’d like to go to college to prepare for a career working with animals, maybe as a veterinarian.

Before she leaves, Geuther asks Mays and his friend to join hands with her and pray. She asks God to watch over them, to help them achieve their dreams. Then she and Mays hug.

A fresh start 
Alexis Smith is 20 now, and Geuther jokes that Smith is her “ambassador” in Cleveland, telling other young people who have “aged out” of foster care what Fill This House can do for them.

Smith was living with a friend when Geuther’s group, which usually works through caseworkers or other nonprofits, came into her life. “We didn’t have anything,” she said. “We were so excited.”

And it wasn’t just any old stuff. Geuther says she makes it a point to ask to ask those served what colors they like and “everything was brand new,” marvels Smith. “If you spend your life in foster care, you get a lot of hand-me-downs. [Geuther] was just so caring."

Geuther likes to tell the story about how when she delivered the microwave to Smith, her roommate started to take the tag off. Smith stopped her, wanting to preserve the “newness” as long as she could. “You could tell how much it meant to her to have something new,” Geuther said.

Smith now lives in the YWCA’s Independence Place – a haven for homeless kids who have aged out of foster care. She says that during her time in the foster system, she was in 17 different homes and attended 23 schools. But she graduated from high school – the first on her mother’s side of the family, Smith says proudly -- and adds that she’s now within reach of her bachelor’s degree. After that, she’s shooting for a master’s.

 She’s not entirely sure what career she wants to pursue, but knows it will be about helping people. “There’s a lot that’s dear to my heart,” she says.

As Smith speaks, Geuther beams. “Good for you,” she says as Smith talks about continuing her education. “I’m so proud of you.”

Filling a house
The opportunity to take over the operation of Fill This House in December 2012 came into Geuther’s life “just as I was praying to find something fulfilling to do,” she says. Liz Tippit, who founded the group in 2007 and remains on the organization’s board, had stepped down and the nonprofit was looking for a new executive director. Geuther stepped up and hasn’t looked back. “When I’m in, I’m in,” she says.

The group, which has no paid staff and no office, raises donations through fundraisers, grants and “showers” like one held recently in Bay. Everyone attending brings a household item to help a former foster child.

On that recent Saturday, the pile in a corner of Fill This House board member Mary Lou Kennedy’s home kept growing as Geuther spread the word about Fill This House to rapt newcomers at the shower. She told them about delivering to young people sleeping on the floor, living in apartments with no water, where the neighborhood seems unsafe, where one obstacle after another seems to present itself.

“These are real kids,” Geuther said, driving home the point of her stories.

It’s especially touching to moms like Barb Sullivan, also a board member, who says she thinks of her own sons and how they would fare entirely on their own at age 18, with no parents to ask for help or advice. Kennedy, also a mom, said she has the same thoughts. “It really touches your heart,” she said.

Added Sullivan: “You realize how blessed we are. And you realize the scars that these kids take with them.”

Board member Dana Hastings says it’s been eye-opening to go on deliveries and see the spare existence facing the former foster children. At one such bare apartment, Hastings recalls, the young woman had a lamp with no shade and a 2-year-old child.

Although Fill This House is based on Christian principles, Geuther said it serves young people regardless of their faith. “There’s a Bible in there,” she tells Mays, pointing to one of the bags she just lugged up the stairs to his apartment. “If you’re not going to use, give it to someone who will.” He says he’ll keep it.

Geuther says there are so many young people like Mays and Smith who need help that Fill This House is trying to broaden its outreach. That goal got a little easier when Great Lakes Computer Corp. offered free warehouse space to store the nonprofit's donations, making it feasible to save money by buying in bulk. Another supporter, Custom Fundraising Solutions, works exclusively with Fill This House to provide mattresses to kids with no beds. As Geuther leaves Mays’ apartment, she lingers on the steps, dispensing some parting advice: Talk to College Now Greater Cleveland about how to pay for college, follow up with your caseworker for a voucher for the Cleveland Furniture Bank and “call me if you need help.”

And, as she says she does at every delivery: “We believe in you and we are praying for you.”

 For more information about Fill This House, call Geuther at 216-513-5447 or email lgeuther@fillthishouse.org.

Press Release from Rahab’s Hideaway

Columbus, Ohio/November 19, 2013- BREAKING NEWS: Rahab’s Hideaway receives Group Home Licensure! The Ohio Department of Job and Family Services (ODJFS) approved licensure application for Rahab’s Hideaway- a 10-bed Group Home for Domestic Minor Sex Trafficked Victims and Runaway Girls. NISRE, Inc., the parent company of Rahab’s Hideaway was notified by ODJFS on November 14, 2013 that the application for Rahab’s Hideaway was approved for full licensure.

This is a dream come true for Rahab’s Hideaway Founder, Marlene Carson, who is a survivor of human trafficking and an advocate who brings education and awareness to the community while comforting, supporting and providing hope to other victims of domestic minor sex trafficking. Carson started Rahab’s Hideaway in 2008 with the dream to one day develop appropriate responses to meet the needs of those who have become victims of Domestic Minor Sex Trafficking; including, but not limited to, the development of a model facility that can provide refuge and facilitate recovery. Such a facility could meet the needs of our community and provide a template, which if followed by others could extend the benefits of our good efforts across our country and around the world. That dream as now become a reality.

Michele Johnson, Founder and CEO of NISRE Inc., recently expanded its agency mission into combating sexual trafficking by providing housing solutions for victims and at risk youth by joining forces with Marlene Carson and bringing Rahab’s Hideaway on board as a program under its parent company. NISRE, Inc. is a faith based, non profit housing organization that is licensed and certified by the Ohio Department of Rehabilitation and Corrections (ODRC) and operate Community Residential Centers in 5 Ohio cities including Columbus, Akron, Mansfield, Cincinnati and Chillicothe. It is the plan of NISRE, Inc. to expand Rahab’s Hideaway in all of the cities where NISRE, Inc. currently operates.

The newly licensed home is now accepting referrals from all Public Children’s Services agencies in Ohio. For information on how to make a referral, please contact us at info@nisreinc.org.

Beth and Dylan in the news

Former foster child and advocate facing homelessness
Wheeler, Kim. WKYC, Dec. 2, 2013.

CLEVELAND -- In October, a local Cleveland State student gave the keynote speech at an all-star event in New York City to help abused and neglected children.

He helped raise hundreds of thousands of dollars for foster children -- like he was.

This child advocate is now facing homelessness himself -- just months after being surrounded by some of the biggest names in show business.

Dylan McIntosh never had a place to call home -- when he was just 3 years old he went into foster care. He was in numerous foster homes from Medina County to Cuyahoga County, changing schools 11 different times.

At 18, Dylan was no longer a foster child -- he aged out without ever being adopted.

McIntosh has been a student at Cleveland State for two years now, and that's the longest he's ever been in one place. He was in 23 different foster homes as a child.

"I never had lasting relationships because I knew in less than a year I would be gone," says Dylan.

That's why when he graduates from CSU he wants to work to change the foster care system. His advocacy even got the attention of the group Children's Rights, which helps abused and neglected kids. He was the keynote speaker in October at their fundraiser in New York City.

"I was on top of the world, and now I'm not sure where I'm going to live," says Dylan. He's been renting a room -- but being new to this, he just had a verbal agreement.

He has to move out next week. He can't afford to rent an apartment and is now looking at homeless shelters.

"One of statistics is that 25 percent of foster youth end up homeless by their 25th birthday," says Beth Dawson of Foster the Soul Ministry. Each month in Cuyahoga County 15 to 20 kids age out of foster care. There are 700 kids right now who may not be adopted before aging out.

If you would like to help Dylan or other foster children who are aging-out of the system, go to www.thedevelopmentproject.org

Dayton article about Ohio Reach

Colleges reach out to foster youth
Support often lacking for the more than 1,000 foster youth who age out of system each year.
Pant, Meagan. Dayton Daily News, Dec. 2, 2014

Caption: Kurt Holden, a Wright State University police officer, leads his dog Galli through the Student Union. Holden had aged out of the foster care system and decided to go to college to have a place to live. Emancipated foster youth Kurt Holden, now a Wright State University police office, wants to be an inspiration to other former foster children.

Kurt Holden enrolled at Wright State University just to have a place to live after he aged out of the foster care system.

The statistics were against him — more than one in five emancipated foster care youth will become homeless after 18, half will be unemployed at age 24 and fewer than 3 percent will earn a college degree by 25, according to the Jim Casey Youth Opportunities Initiative.

Today, Holden has an associate degree from Sinclair Community College, a bachelor’s degree from Wright State and he is pursuing a master’s degree.

He also serves as a role model for other former foster youth trying to make their way through college.

“I wanted to really show them that this is possible,” the 27-year-old Holden said. “I’m an image, someone that they can maybe look up to — to go on and achieve what they thought maybe was impossible because the statistics say it nearly is.”

Local colleges and universities are doing more to support students who have aged out of the foster care system — a population they say is the most at-risk of being homeless, dropping out and needing public assistance for much of their lives.

Every year, more than 1,000 young people in Ohio and 26,000 nationwide age out without anyone to turn to for support, anywhere to live or anyway to make a living. A new study says the cost of doing nothing to support those young adults is $300,000 on average over their lifetimes in public assistance, incarceration and lost wages — adding up to $7.8 billion spent by communities and taxpayers, according to the group Success Beyond 18.

Building accountability
Holden works as a Wright State University police officer and patrols the campus with his bomb dog, Galli. He volunteers with Wright State’s Independent Scholars Network, which was established four years ago to support and guide former foster care youth.

Before the network was created, foster care students lacked a guiding hand to make the university experience less intimidating. Wright State officials heard from one student about his move-in day experience. He was dropped off at the Student Union in a white van with just two Meijer plastic bags containing his personal possessions and had no one to help him navigate what to do next, said Simone Polk, assistant vice president for student services at WSU.

Polk said they agreed: “We don’t want that to happen again.” Now, the university welcomes foster students on move-in day with a special dinner and welcome baskets containing items parents might typically buy. They attend a bootcamp, college writing workshops, get study coaches and more. The university also awards two competitive $500 scholarships each year.

There are now nearly 50 former foster students on campus. Students agree to participate in at least 70 percent of the activities offered and volunteer at the campus food pantry — which is a strong accountability factor, Holden said. “When I was in foster care, there’s no accountability. It’s just you, by yourself. So we want to build all that accountability around the network so they feel they have a sense of responsibility to achieve success,” he said. “We give them every opportunity to be successful and all we ask them to do is show up.”

Helpful resources
Students now get help through Ohio Reach, which provides an online resource where students can find contact information for a liaison on campus who can connect them with resources they need.

That can help students who might be embarrassed to ask for help on issues such as not having a place to stay during winter break, said Chris Klefeker, who was formerly the foster care liaison at Miami University Hamilton.

“Having someone that can just make a phone call for you… part of that is not having to tell your story over and over. So you don’t go over to financial aid and stand in line and say, ‘I need extra money for books because I was in foster care’… And then to go over to records and have to say it again,” she said. “It becomes a really demoralizing experience.”

Those liaisons can help the students overcome barriers, which can start with the fee to even apply for college, which might be $50. Miami has a question on its application form where former foster youth can identify themselves to be contacted for help.

There are 19 former foster care youth on the Hamilton campus now. “Our ultimate goal is that people will choose to come to college and will be retained here, and graduate and be successful,” she said.

But there is a disconnect, she said: Over 70 percent of foster youth say in high school they want to go to college, and yet about 2 percent graduate.

“That’s troubling,” Polk said. “Because we know that the American dream is going to be more difficult to achieve in the years coming. And that opportunities and access to employment to earn a living wage above the minimum wage is going to require a bachelor’s degree.”

‘I can actually be somebody’
Mariah Maxwell said she never thought about going to college when she was in foster care. She entered the system when she was 10 years old, lived in 11 different homes and aged out after high school.

“I was going to keep working at Kroger, the job that I had,” she said.

But that changed when she was paired with a mentor through the Higher Education Mentoring Initiative. She showed Maxwell how different college was than high school by allowing her to sit in on class at the University of Cincinnati.

In April, Maxwell was the first HEMI participate to graduate from the University of Cincinnati. She earned two degrees is psychology and criminal justice. And she is now pursuing a master’s degree in criminal justice there and has a son of her own, 18-month-old Mosiah.

“Without this program I wouldn’t be where I am today,” she said. “It made me realize I can actually be somebody and I didn’t have to be a statistic.”

HEMI was created in Hamilton County four years ago. Mentors in the program can help students visit college campuses, fill out forms to apply for financial aid and find scholarships, said program coordinator Annie Schellinger.

Changing the stigma
Holden said he was too young to remember when he entered foster care. He lived in at least six homes and changed schools multiple times.

“The foster care system was never set up to be a permanent system,” he said. “It was a set up for a temporary placement to fix whatever issues they had and then return that placement. But it’s turned into more of a permanent lifestyle.”

Policies vary between states about how long youth can receive support, and some provide free tuition for public schools to former foster youth. Ohio does not.

After a year at Wright State, Holden said he saved enough money to go to Sinclair and have an apartment. “I was the first in my family to achieve a degree,” he said.

Holden said he wanted to do the opposite of his drug-addicted father and mother and “be something someday.” He also wanted to break the cycle for his wife and nearly two-year-old son.

“I found my motivation through all that brokenness,” he said, adding that he was also motivated by his three brothers, who were also in foster care. Ultimately he wants to change the stigma that is sometimes attached to foster youth.

“We have just as much potential (as other students),” he said. “We may have some emotional scars from our past, but we can use that as our driving force.”

Plain Dealer discussion continues...

Guest Columnist: Children in foster care need support after age 18
Chapman, John. Cleveland Plain Dealer, Nov. 28, 2013

Did you need a parent after age 18? 

My five adopted sons over the age of 18 did, and we anticipate their younger, 16-year-old adopted brother will, also.

Similarly, foster children, who age out of the child protection system at age 18, need parental help. Foster children, just like my sons, need someone to help them deal honestly with traumatic emotional issues resulting from their abusive birth homes, with girl/boyfriend issues without the violence they witnessed prior to entering the child protection system, and with the frustrating bureaucratic issues related to Medicaid, college, job, lease and loan applications, bank accounts and related debit, credit and prepaid cards, income tax returns, and school Individual Education Plans that can drive even seasoned adults to anger.

Plus, as my 18-year-old son Monty said, “I need someone to come home to.” 

Monty states a need for someone to guide him when he “screws up.” He wants someone to empathetically listen to him vent about the “irritations of life.” And, Monty desires someone to help him learn how to drive once he gets to a level of responsibility where he will stop at every stop sign or not text while driving.

Thankfully, he wants me to help him with his wishes. But, unfortunately, most aging-out foster children do not have someone to assist them with these basic needs. Instead, they feel alone.

Can we help foster kids like Candice Woodland, highlighted in Phillip Morris’ Nov. 24 Plain Dealer column, not feel abandoned? Can our community, through a public, private and philanthropic partnership, develop an innovative program to help kids aging out of its child protection system?

This type of partnership worked once before. Led by the United Way Community Vision Council on Strong Families=Successful Children, Cuyahoga County, companies like Eaton and funders like the Gund Foundation and Cleveland Foundation came together to create the Adopt Cuyahoga’s Kids Initiative in 2003. This initiative, for which I served as an oversight co-chair, proved instrumental in helping reduce the number of children available for adoption in Cuyahoga County from 1,700 in 2004 to 610 in July 2012.

The Adopt Cuyahoga’s Kids Initiative, led by Adoption Network Cleveland (ANC), won many national awards for adoption innovations. But, it left unanswered the question of what might happen to children that could not or did not want to be adopted prior to emancipation; young people ill-prepared for the intellectual, emotional and financial responsibilities of adulthood like Candice Woodland.

We knew that this issue needed addressing back in 2003. Our studies to justify the expense of Adopt Cuyahoga’s Kids Initiative showed the significant societal cost of incarceration or perpetuation of the abuse cycle due to these young people aging out of the child protection system.

But, the adoption crisis needed to be addressed first. Can we now come back together to help our aging-out children and guide them through young adulthood? Parents that can help these young adults continue their journey towards becoming respectful and responsible adult members of our community by learning to deal with the frustrations adults face like bureaucracies, forms and applications. But, more importantly, can we find someone for these young adults “to come home to?”

John Chapman, father of six adopted children, was the co-chair of United Way Community Vision Council on Strong Families=Successful Children in 2003 and received the Angel in Adoption Congressional Award in 2012.

Editorial on the needs of "aging out" foster youth

Editorial: Foster-care youth need a far better safety net
Cleveland Plain Dealer, Nov. 27, 2013.

Cuyahoga County has worked hard to get eligible youngsters adopted. Now it has to work just as hard to help youth who age out of the system find a home, a job and a mentor. Gus Chan, The Plain Dealer Thanks to two illuminating columns by The Plain Dealer's Phillip Morris, we know what happens when former foster-care kids end up practically on the streets.

 It's not a pretty sight. Kevin Ballard and Candice Woodland, who both aged out of the foster-care system, have spent the last few years sleeping on friends' sofas and trying to find a place they can call home.

With the help of the Urban League, the YWCA, Volunteers of America and loving, extended and foster families, Ballard and Woodland didn't hit rock bottom after they fell between the cracks.

Others aren't as lucky. The John Casey Youth Opportunities Initiatives program, which focuses on kids who have "aged out" of foster care, has found that, nationally, 58 percent of former foster-care students fail to graduate from high school by 19 and fewer than 3 percent have a college degree by age 25.

Similar fates stalk the 200 people who age out of Cuyahoga County's foster-care system each year.

Cuyahoga County and surrounding counties with large foster-care clientele, such as Lorain and Summit, have a moral obligation to create a far better safety net for these youth to help ease their rocky transition to adulthood. The best way to do that is to make sure that more of these youngsters are adopted so that they have permanent homes and families they can rely on to help guide them through adulthood.

But that won't be possible for every youngster. Patricia Rideout, director of Cuyahoga County Children and Family Services, says that many youngsters are entering foster care when they are 15 or 16 and have no interest in being adopted.

Yet too many of them end up in the streets after they turn 18, not knowing where to turn. Their safety net is a hodgepodge with too little coordination or communication about the resources available. 

That must change -- something social service agencies and Cuyahoga County children's services department are working on. The Cleveland YWCA, for example, has 23 furnished apartments for young people from 18 to 24 who have documented proof they are homeless and have a disability.

Here's what these young people need to know: Foster-care youth who age out of the system in Cuyahoga County can turn to their former caseworkers and get services when they are in trouble, says Mary Louise Madigan, a spokeswoman for Cuyahoga County Children and Family Services.

Scott Britton, assistant director of Public Children Services Association of Ohio, an umbrella group for child welfare services, says these young adults are eligible for Medicaid and education and training vouchers for school. Wright State University even has a scholars program for former foster-care children that offers counseling and mentoring, says Britton.

But these resources can be hard for a young person on his or her own to navigate.

Fortunately, a consortium of social service agencies including Sisters of Charity, FrontLine Service, which is a Cleveland mental health services organization, and others have teamed up with the Jim Casey program to hire a program coordinator to help prevent homelessness, a major risk confronting these young adults.

Casey's "You're our kids forever," philosophy is valuable, says Eric Morse, the chief operation officer of Cleveland-based FrontLine Service, which provides supportive housing to former foster-care children. Youth with fragile ties to their biological and foster-care families need an adult mentor or caseworkers to keep them on the right course.

Here's where the community comes in: Betsie Norris, CEO of Adoption Network Cleveland, says that her agency's mentorship program for kids aging out of foster care could use more mentors. At least 25 youngsters are on the waiting list. You can reach her program at www.adoptionnetwork.org/volunteer-mentoring.aspx

And Morse says his housing program could use household items such as pots, pans and kitchen utensils to help young adults set up their first apartment. Donations can be given through frontlineservice.org

For more on the local YWCA's Nurturing Independence and Aspirations program that supports and houses at-risk foster kids aging out of the system, contact Teresa Sanders at 216-881-6878 or tsanders@ywcaofcleveland.org

Young people like Kevin Ballard and Candice Woodland deserve a helping hand from the rest of us.

We have failed them long enough.

Cleveland Plain Dealer shedding light on challenges for youth who "age out" of foster care

One man's journey from foster care to the streets is a familiar refrain
Morris, Phillip. Cleveland Plain Dealer, Nov. 17, 2014

Kevin Ballard is homeless. He has been homeless since he aged out of foster care at the age of 18 in 2010.

Why should you care?

Because we as a society tend to mostly ignore this extremely vulnerable population, young adults who are emancipated from foster care. We send a check to a host family up until a kid turns 18 and then we turn our backs. That’s when bad things quickly happen. That’s when these children – now without the most basic family structure or consistent support systems – are left to fend for themselves. Then we pay for it on the backend.

That’s where Kevin finds himself. He is at that wildly confusing and dangerous point in life when far too many foster children, especially males, resume their status as wards of the state, this time through incarceration.

During the three years since Kevin aged out of foster care, he has found shelter mostly through the kindness - and couches - of friends, family and strangers. Before that, he bounced between seven foster homes from ages 13 to 18.

 Life after foster care for Kevin, whose mother died when he was six months old, has been tough, insecure and unsafe. The streets have constantly beckoned.

In July, he was admitted into a 50-bed shelter run by the Volunteers of America on Cleveland’s near West Side. It is the only shelter in the County specifically geared for men between the ages of 18-24. The shelter staff works to find employment for its residents.

But with no high school diploma, any real work experience, or support system Kevin has been a hard placement. And he has grown increasingly frustrated.

This past summer he continued to make poor choices and to have minor brushes with the law. He continued a pattern of destroying relations with any biological family members who would take his calls. He stole (borrowed) his favorite Aunt’s car and initially faced a grand theft auto charge, a charge which was reduced to an unauthorized use of a vehicle.

In October he found a glimmer of hope, though. That’s when the same aunt, Ladeidra Ballard, a Cuyahoga County probation officer, and perhaps the last family member to believe in Kevin, steered him to the Urban League of Greater Cleveland’s job training program.

That’s where he said he felt an awakening. "I was really skeptical at first. I didn’t really see the point. But when my aunt signed me up I decided I had to give it a try."

After the first week he was hooked. Why? The staff at the Urban League convinced him to believe in himself. That simple.

Convince a kid to believe in himself and you can potentially convince a young man to change his outlook and his behavior. The Urban League taught him basic job interviewing skills and showed him how to construct a resume, even though he had never had a job worth mentioning. The staff there told him he could soar.

It sounds cliched. But he had never heard that before.

"I’ve made a lot of mistakes and burned a lot of bridges. When I was in foster care I didn’t feel like I had to let anyone tell me what to do," said Kevin. "But now I see where I still have some growing up to do. I need to take more responsibility for myself. I need to find work; I need to find a job. I don’t want to live in a homeless shelter," Kevin said.

The Urban League gave him a black blazer and a necktie. It was part of the effort to bolster his self-confidence and to make him appear and feel as if he were ready to enter the workforce. The makeover worked.

Perhaps, too well. Kevin was robbed at gunpoint last Friday afternoon just as he was reinventing himself. He was robbed of $25, a cell phone and a monthly bus pass, just when he was starting to look at himself in a different light and to see his own potential. He was robbed just as he was nervously preparing to go on his first real job interview, an overnight stocking position with Wal-Mart.

He was robbed, he said, because the hoodlums that assaulted him had recently seen him in the neighborhood, dressed like a wannabe businessman, not a homeless, desperate 21-year-old former gang-banger, who had just graduated from a job training program.

"When they started walking toward me I knew what was about to go down, so I squared up (to fight). That’s when one of the dudes pulled a gun and said, ‘we don’t fight, we shoot.’" Ironically, it wasn’t the gun pointed at his head that disturbed Kevin most. Last Friday wasn’t the first time he’d stared down the business end of a pistol. What really made his blood boil is his unshakable suspicion that his new black blazer was the anatomy of the robbery. He believes he stood out and attracted negative attention because he appeared vulnerable, as if he didn’t belong in the neighborhood.

One step forward. Two steps back.

Kevin remains undeterred, though. Friday afternoon he told me he was tentatively offered the job at Wal-Mart, but that it was predicated on a urine sample returning clean. When I spoke to him he was nervously awaiting the results. He’s ready to work.

The question remains, however, can he find the strength to muscle through the residual emotional damage – and profound aloneness - he experienced as he bounced between foster families? Can he begin to create his own sense of family and familiarity where none has ever existed before? Can he develop a sense of belonging to a community and to a workforce?

While some foster children retain contact with their nuclear foster families and thrive and others muddle along assisted by social services organizations that provide a baseline safety net, countless foster children are simply left to fend for themselves after emancipation.

That’s Kevin’s plight. He has good self-awareness. He’s intelligent and articulate. But most of all, he wants and envisions a better life. A life that gives him a fighting chance.

Now if only this former foster child can avoid the thugs on the block, some of whom will misinterpret his black blazer for weakness. If only he can find the resources and the will to avoid predators who will violently attempt to pull him back into the streets he’s trying so hard to leave. If only he will develop a life long work ethic, he just may thrive.

Kevin has aged out of foster care. But aged into what kind of life remains the burning question.

Ohio's very own John Davis, former President of the OHIO Youth Advisory Board

A successful life after foster care
Xenia Daily Gazette, 11/1/2013.

BEAVERCREEK — John Davis does not claim that living in a foster care group home for three and a half years was the ideal place to grow up. He does, however, acknowledge that Greene County Children Services’ Alpha Group Home was safer and more stable than the situation in which he had formerly been. He also says that his time there helped shape him into who he is today.

“Any time I have a chance to explain where I come from, I do,” said John. “Overall, living in the group home was a great experience. The staff tried their best to make it like a home and I’m very appreciative of that.” Davis’ former home life, he had witnessed the effects of substance abuse, and had personally experienced physical abuse and neglect.

After being in the custody of Greene County Children Services since 2009, John turned 18 last November, joining the ranks of children who have emancipated from the foster care system without being adopted. According to multiple studies, a majority of these children end up homeless and/or unemployed due to the lack of a stable family support system. In addition, they are less likely than the general population to finish high school, and they rarely graduate from college or earn more than minimum wage if they are employed. Nearly a third are incarcerated at some point.

John is determined to not become one of these disheartening statistics, and he is well on his way to succeeding. He is currently attending Gillette College in Gillette, Wyo. He got there, in part, by way of earning a performing arts scholarship from Energy City Voices, the college’s show choir.

“I became interested in singing and dancing during my sophomore year at Beavercreek High School,” said John. “I talked a friend into trying out for a talent show with me. We did a dance duet. After seeing my performance, members of the school show choir asked me to try out so I did and I got accepted.”

The rest, as they say, is history. Davis had soon formed his own dance troupe called B-Fierce. He also signed up for acting classes and performed in musicals including Fame and Anything Goes. Extracurricular school groups he became involved in included the A Capella Choir, Peer Listening Group and Gay-Straight Alliance.

Along the way, John also used his developing leadership skills to become the President of the Overcoming Hurdles in Ohio Youth Advisory Board (OHIO YAB), a group that seeks to influence policies that affect youth in foster care. In this capacity, from October 2012 through August 2013, John spoke at a variety of conferences focused on child welfare.

When he decided to audition for the Energy City Voices scholarship, he got plenty of support: his former high school show choir director let him use the choir’s performance space and a Children Services staff member played piano.

Following his first-ever airplane flight, John began his college experience by attending Energy City Voices’ summer camp in mid-August. The camp is described on the college’s website as “just what you need to share and expand your talents, all among the beauty and nature of the Big Horn Mountains.” John described the experience as “tons of fun.”

He has easily settled into dorm life, something he found he was well prepared for from living in the group home with eight other boys for three and a half years. He shares a dorm apartment with three other members of the show choir, an arrangement he calls “a blessing.” While it was his singing and dancing talent that won him the scholarship, John is actually majoring in Social Sciences.

Becoming a choreographer is his dream, but as a back-up plan, his goal is to become a social worker. “Dance is my outlet but social work is something that’s also very important to me,” he explained. “I would love to work with children and help them through some of the same life struggles that I’ve been through. The Children Services workers in Greene County actually spent the time to work with each individual kid in the group home and focus on our individual needs. They all led me in the right direction in their own ways.”

Greene County Children Services is a division of the Greene County Department of Job & Family Services and provides for the care, protection and placement of abused, neglected and dependent children in Greene County. The agency engages in a wide spectrum of protective activities including the assessment of thousands of child abuse and neglect reports received each year. It also provides preventive services to children in their own homes as well as providing temporary and permanent child placement through foster care, adoption, group home and independent living programs.

Article about 2013 Connecting the Dots Conference

Fostered teens in Ohio get lessons in making it on their own
Blackwell, Brandon. Cleveland Plain Dealer, July 28, 2013.

COLUMBUS, Ohio -- Next month, 19-year-old Re’Gine Wells will leave foster care. The looming independence frightens her, but on Thursday Wells gained a bit of courage to tackle life outside the system.

The Clevelander was one of nearly 300 fostered teens from around the state who descended on Columbus for the “Connecting the Dots Conference,” where those facing autonomous adulthood were given tips and tools to make it on their own.

The conference, now in its second year and sponsored by the Ohio Department of Job and Family Services, provided a day of workshops and mentoring on resume writing, dressing for a job interview, renting an apartment and more.

“You are here today because at some point in your life very soon you are going to leave the foster care system, and we have to get you ready to leave,” said Michael Colbert, ODJFS director, during the conference’s opening remarks. “You will succeed. When you leave foster care, it is our goal that you go to work, or college, or the armed forces -- not through a door that is not positive.”

Nationally, about 81 percent of males formerly in foster care are arrested by the time they turn 24, and nearly half of all females formerly in foster care become pregnant by the time they turn 19, according to ODJFS.

“We are going to change foster care for the better in this state,” Colbert said. “We are not going to accept the status quo.”

Benjamin Johnson, ODJFS spokesman, said more than 1,000 young people in Ohio age out of foster care each year. Many age out at 18, but those who are still in high school or are pursuing a GED may stay in foster care until they finish, he said.

Wells recently completed her GED.

“I’m really scared right now, but I think I’ll make it,” Wells said. “The [Connect the Dots] program gives me confidence. I think it’s great that I get to learn and socialize with people who can relate to me.”

Those at the conference were able to choose among more than a dozen workshops to attend. Topics included personal health, public speaking and applying to college. Wells, who entered the foster system at age 15, said she hopes to attend Cuyahoga Community College in the spring.

“I’d like to be an accountant or financial adviser,” Wells said. “I love working with numbers.”

The conference is part of a larger “Connecting the Dots” initiative, which brings together ODJFS and Big Brothers Big Sisters to help allay the struggles of transitioning out of foster care. “Connecting the Dots” in April announced it would launch its program in five pilot locations, including Cuyahoga County, with the goal of determining best practices across the state.

The program will bring “fundamental, systemic changes” to foster care in Ohio, Colbert said.

Wells is grateful for the support. “I don’t think you could advocate enough for foster care,” she said. “We just want the same opportunities as everyone else. We’re not all damaged goods.”

Summit County Connecting the Dots Program

Summit County attempts to smooth transition for foster kids aging out of the system
Armon, Rick. Akron Beacon Journal, July 25, 2013.                 

Saunja Mayfield, a clothing specialist with Summit County Children Services, talks about her involvement in the pilot program called Connecting the Dots, during an interview in her office on Wednesday, June 26, 2013, in Akron, Ohio. The program tries to help foster kids who are aging out of the system with real life situations. (Ed Suba Jr./Akron Beacon Journal)

 

Summit County attempts to smooth transition for foster kids aging out of the systemJuly 26,2013 04:00 PM GMTRick ArmonBeacon Journal Publishing Co. Copyright � 2013 Beacon Journal Publishing Co. Inc and Black Press. All Rights Reserved. Any copying, redistribution or retransmission of any of the contents of this service without the express written consent of the Akron Beacon Journal is expressly prohibited.

After about eight years living with foster families, Saunja Mayfield wanted to break free of the system and be on her own.

At 19, she thought she knew it all and wanted to live by her own rules, just like any rebellious teen.
Looking back, Mayfield, now 24, admits she was unprepared for life with no family or institutional support. She ended up homeless bouncing from house to house.

“Life hits you hard after you get out,” she said. “You feel like the whole world is against you.”
Her experience is common for the 1,000 to 1,300 young Ohioans — and estimated 24,000 kids nationwide — who age out of the foster care system each year.

To try to improve the oftentimes bumpy transition, the Ohio Department of Job and Family Services, Big Brothers Big Sisters and eight counties, including Summit, have launched a pilot program called “Connecting the Dots from Foster Care to Employment and Independent Living.”

It’s designed to better prepare foster kids and those recently emancipated for work, vocational training or college, and just plain living on their own.

Summit, Cuyahoga, Hamilton, Lake, Montgomery, Preble, Clinton and Greene counties are participating. The state has devoted nearly $6 million in Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF) money for the three-year effort, including $537,000 in Summit.

The goal is eventually to roll out the best practices statewide.

Sobering statistics
Without parents pushing and teaching life lessons, the odds are stacked against foster kids. And there’s no safety net for them to fall back on.

Nationally, 81 percent of the boys are arrested by age 24, while 48 percent of the girls become pregnant by age 19.

A third have household incomes below the poverty level, a quarter experience post-traumatic stress disorder, and nearly a quarter end up homeless.

“We know that the statistics nationwide for young adults who leave foster care without being adopted are not good,” said Benjamin Johnson, spokesman with the Ohio Department of Job and Family Services. “We wanted to develop a program to counteract that.”

Boot camp
The Summit County program involves giving the at-risk teens a job for two years, assigning them mentors, offering tutoring and providing career counseling along the way.

A collaborative effort among the county Department of Job & Family Services, Children Services and agencies such as Goodwill Industries, the program began last month with a “boot camp” at the Job Center in Akron.

Nearly 30 teens gathered to play games and listen to a variety of speakers, including Mayfield.
She now works as a clothing specialist, ironically, at Summit County Children Services, the same agency that she was so desperate to escape.

One of eight children, she ended up in foster care after her parents were busted for drug problems.
The Akron woman, who has a 1-year-old child and is not married, dreams of becoming a social worker or counselor so she can help others.

Her advice for those in the system: Take advantage of all the educational opportunities offered and don’t feel sorry for yourself.

“You’re not the only foster kid in the world,” Mayfield said. “Don’t be bitter about it.”

One day at the boot camp, the topics ranged from building credit to how to dress for a job interview to staying out of trouble to riding the bus.

For foster kids, these are big issues.

“Young men, if I can see your underwear, you won’t even start to be interviewed,” Goodwill Industries Director of Career Services Christine Fontaine told them bluntly.

Meanwhile, Robert Sukel, a program manager at Greenleaf Family Center in Akron, advised them to be careful with their cash.

“There are so many people out there trained to separate you from your money,” he said.

On the job
Ten of the teens are working at the Goodwill facility on Waterloo Road in Akron.

“The important part with these kids is teaching basic work skills,” Fontaine said during a recent tour. “We’re trying to instill a work ethic.”

That, of course, and encourage them to pursue a career. They have grown up with a narrow view of the work world and don’t even consider some careers.

“Why can’t you be a registered nurse?” Fontaine asked. “Why can’t you be a chef?”

Nervous excitement
The Beacon Journal sat down with three teens participating in the Connecting the Dots program at Goodwill.

All three had become emancipated within the last couple of weeks.

They expressed excitement over their newfound freedom and, at the same time, nervousness.

Cortez Brown, 18, of Akron, now lives in his own apartment with financial help from Children Services. He will be training at Stark State College to be an auto technician and also wants to enter the music industry.

His foster parents warned him in advance about the expenses he would face: Rent, utilities and groceries, for example.

“I was kind of worried, kind of scared and it was kind of frightening that I was on my own,” Brown said. “I didn’t have anybody else. I was going to take care of myself. After that [initial feeling], things started to work out for me and I’m starting to get used to it.”

Ashley Hosterman, 18, of Akron, still lives with her foster family. She feels prepared for being on her own.

“I know a lot of things, but maybe not everything,” said Hosterman, who wants to be a massage therapist. “Yes, I am ready. That way I can finally say, ‘This is my home. This is my place.’ ”

But they also questioned whether anyone or any program can truly prepare foster kids for the experience. Sometimes, teens just don’t listen.

“I don’t think anybody can teach you,” said Kara Sweet, 19, who lives at the Highlands shelter because she’s pregnant and is headed to Stark State to study culinary arts and restaurant management. “You have to do it for yourself.”

Ohio ranks 50th -- last -- when it comes to state funding for child welfare