Fostering independence

Guidance from peers, adults can help young people ‘aging out’ of foster care make the leap into adulthood

Krysta White (left) prepares a speech on Aug. 9 for the convention of the Arkansas Youth Advisory Board. She is president of the board, which helps youths in the foster care system as they prepare to transition out of state care. Her sister, Sedella, a former president, provides assistance and support.
Krysta White (left) prepares a speech on Aug. 9 for the convention of the Arkansas Youth Advisory Board. She is president of the board, which helps youths in the foster care system as they prepare to transition out of state care. Her sister, Sedella, a former president, provides assistance and support.

Krysta White has been lucky enough to have a big sister to show her the ropes. She and her sister, Sedella White, were encouraged by their teachers and their foster parents to follow their dreams in the 10 years since they entered the foster care system.

Not all foster kids, though, have that kind of support.

Youngsters growing up in homes with parents can generally move into adulthood at their own pace, falling back on their families for advice or support when they need to. Children who are wards of the state, on the other hand, have to become independent based on their birth dates.

“Sedella was a year ahead of me in school so everything she experienced let me know what I need to do and what track I needed to be on. I really follow in her footsteps. I mean, I change up here and there but I pretty much follow everything that she does, or try to. She is amazing … but not every foster child has that,” says Krysta, 19. She and her sister have been in foster care since 2003, and have lived during that time in shelters, group homes and various foster homes. “All foster youth need a big support system when they’re transitioning, whether that be for middle school to high school or junior high to high school or high school to college, because even though it’s my junior year, I still feel like I’m transitioning, and next year I’m going to be transitioning out of foster care.”

The Arkansas Department of Human Services Division of Children and Family Services’ transitional services program is meant to fill in for families that are absent from the lives of so many foster children who, for whatever reason, aren’t in permanent placements as teens.

Lessons taught through the program are wide-reaching, according to Jonathan Dunkley, state coordinator of transitional youth services.

“They are basic sufficiency skills sets that everyone has but takes for granted - opening a checking account, learning how to make chicken noodle soup when you’re sick and doing a lot of those things on your own, learning how to cook and learning how to budget, learning how to think about what you want to be when you grow up. Because of the dysfunction of the homes they were removed from, in many instances that conversation about going to college or preparing to be successful hasn’t been had,” he explains.

PEER COUNSELORS

Because kids are more likely to listen to their peers than to adults - especially when they have been repeatedly let down by the adults in their lives, the Department of Human Services depends partly on a board of 20 teenagers, two from each of 10 regions of the state, who are successfully navigating the foster care system to counsel fellow foster children as they approach young adulthood and the end of their state support.

The Arkansas Youth Advisory Board, made up of remarkable foster youths recommended by caseworkers, court appointed special advocates or guardians ad litem (legal representatives/advisers), helps develop policies for the transitional program, offers peer-to-peer support for other foster youths and puts together the annual Teen Leadership Conference, affectionately referred to by board members as “YAB State.”

The conference, held this year on Aug. 13 and 14 in Little Rock, gave board members a chance to tell other kids in the transitional program what they believe their peers need to know to succeed after foster care.

Sedella, 20, of North Little Rock, is a former president of the board, and Krysta has followed in her footsteps.

“Our theme is ‘History in the Making,’ telling them that we make our own history and that nobody else can choose our history for us,” says Krysta, who is a junior psychology major at the University of Arkansas at Monticello. She considers Cabot to be her hometown because that’s the address of her foster family.

MAKING CHOICES

Overburdened case workers don’t always find the time to help foster children figure out for themselves how to reach their goals and instead try to redirect those children into areas they view as more appropriate, Krysta says.

“We’re constantly told what we have to do. They really don’t let us make our own decisions. What I really want to get out is that it’s up to them,” she says. “Because after foster care, where are those people going to be who told you ‘no’ all the time? They’re not going to have to live the life that they chose for us. We’re having to live that life.”

Krysta led a workshop at the conference that covered taking the ACT assessment and sending scores to colleges and applying for financial aid. She also let participants know they can get money for college - as much as $5,000 a year - if they stay in the foster care system until they’re 21 instead of seeking emancipation at 18.

Sedella intended to leave the system when she was 18, but stayed in for that reason.

“When it comes down to deciding to stay in care - there is that feeling that your life is being micromanaged or feeling like certain people are having more say in your life than you are. When a foster kid has left care or decided that 18 is it, it’s been that they’ve had to put up with people meddling in their lives for too many years,” she says.

PLANNING AHEAD

Act 391 of 2009 gives foster children the right to stay in the state’s care until they’re 21, and requires the state to establish a plan for the transition to adulthood by their 17th birthdays.

For many, planning starts earlier than that.

“Being a foster kid, to be honest, makes you want to plan ahead because I have this whole outlook that I don’t want to let people down and let people stereotype me as ‘she’s just a foster child, she’s not going to amount to anything,’” Krysta says. “That has always made me want to plan ahead and be one step ahead of everybody else.”

Byron “B.J.” Johnson, 19, of Little Rock, also a board member, has been preparing for his future since 10th grade, which is around the time he re-entered the foster care system - he has been in and out of state care since he was 6 years old. He considered joining the military at 18 and using the GI Bill to fund his education, but his high school counselor and a military recruiter both stressed the importance of college so he started working to get his grades up. He wants to be a graphic designer and starts college at the University of Arkansas at Pine Bluff this fall.

He talks to other foster youths about doing the same thing, even if there’s no one pushing them to do that except themselves.

Nineteen-year-old Lien Le, too, formulated a path long ago. Le wants to be a doctor and she has taken into account the fact that that’s a long process that could require some adjustments to complete.

“I got my first job when I was a sophomore in high school and I’m still working at the same job right now. Ever since I’ve been working there I’ve saved half of my paycheck and so I have some savings,” she says.

Le encourages other foster youth to find someone - a friend, a teacher, someone within the foster care system - with whom to create a lasting relationship.

“I have a permanency plan. I have someone I can always go to and talk to who will always be there for me,” she says. “You know, the one you can always go to and know that person won’t just disappear out of nowhere.”

MOVING FORWARD

Justin Devlin, 17, of Little Rock uses his Youth Advisory Board position to help his peers cope with moving from placement to placement.

“I would be in foster care for about a year and then go back home and then come back into the system. It was very frustrating, especially when you’re younger and nobody really listens to you and you don’t have any control over where people put you. I was in shelters and foster homes and other places,” he says. “Every place and every person’s home is not the same and you have to cope and get accustomed to their routines and it’s frustrating because if you go to three or four homes you have to learn how that person is so you cannot make them upset.”

Devlin dreams of becoming an anesthesiologist.

“Having DHS on my side has really helped because I plan on going through college with little or no debt,” he says.

When he finishes college, after he’s 21, he’ll take out loans for medical school, he says. He would love to have a mentor in the medical field.

“I just don’t know how to go about that. You can’t really just go up to UAMS [University of Arkansas for Medical Sciences] and be like, ‘Hey, I want to be an anesthesiologist,’ you know,” he says. “I plan to volunteer at a hospital, you know, to get my foot in the door. Maybe from there I could get someone to mentor me.”

Finding mentors for Arkansas foster youth is one of Sedella’s goals. As a board member, she worked with state officials and other board members to create a publication that answered the most pressing questions children just entering the foster system might have - “When can I see my family? What are my rights?”

“I would really like to see a mentor-mentee thing in the state of Arkansas for foster youth. You know, kind of like a grown-up version of Big Brothers Big Sisters. I definitely think that’s something that we need,” she says.

Foster youth - especially young adults who have aged out of the foster system - could benefit from having someone to call on for advice about school, jobs, doing their taxes, buying a car, etc., says Sedella, who will age out of the system herself in a matter of months.

“Those things are so necessary. I just wish people in the community knew that it doesn’t take being a foster family - taking the time to speak with kids helps,” she says. “It helps kids to know someone somewhere has got your back.”

Family, Pages 32 on 08/21/2013

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