On Thursday, February 24, 2022, our social justice group was given the opportunity to meet with April Dinwoodie, who was a former marketing executive in the fashion industry but now is an activist who creates podcasts and helps influences people to help Black and Brown foster children to find loving and safe homes. April identifies as a black and biracial woman. At an early age, April was adopted into a white family. She shared her story on how she navigated life living as a black and biracial woman in a white family.
Boston, Massachusetts is where April June Dinwoodie was born. Helen June, who is her biological mother, couldn’t care for April so she was put in foster care. Also, April has no information about her biological father. After a few months, April was adopted by a white family. The name that April was given at birth by her biological mother was June. April now as a podcast called “Born in June, Raised in April.” However, April’s forever parents named her April. And by the way, April was never born in April or June. (April was born in October so she found this really funny during the interview) Then June became April’s middle name.
Coming into the Dinwoodie family was a welcoming experience for April, although she was the only adopted and Black/Bi-Racial child in the family. She felt different from her siblings of experience because of her race, but her family did not treat her differently despite her differences. April felt accepted at home, but once she got to middle school, she started to get bullied by her peers. Growing up in a predominately white environment as a Black/Bi-Racial girl was hard, and April had to protect herself. Her parents were not aware of what was happening and they did not share the same racial experiences as her. April felt stuck and didn’t know who to talk to about the bullying at school. She encountered lots of racism as she grew up, so this sparked an interest in making changes for other kids like her who were going through similar experiences. When April was in her 20s, she wanted to look for her birth mother, Helen, but Helen didn’t want to meet or see her. April was heartbroken, she said. A quote from April was, “It felt as if she had a ‘double rejection’ because her birth mother didn’t accept her when she was born and later rejected her when she was a grown adult.” This is when April started to become an activist for children of color in the foster care and adoptions systems. Since there are 200,00 children in foster care every year, April explained to us, black and brown foster children are always represented disproportionally than their white counterparts, and black and brown children stay in foster care for longer. One thing that I found really interesting during this interview with April was that she said that adoption agencies and adoptive families “claimed to not see color.” I thought this was really interesting because you do need to see color, you just have to be aware of your bias and privilege a lot of the time. And April totally agreed. April wanted to become an activist so agencies and families see the color, just in a different way. April supports programs and events that make families aware of the color in some kids. She also quoted this, explaining from her own experiences, what she wants other kids of color in the foster care and adoption systems to feel, “Parents must listen to their children and understand what is best for their future. April wants to help all Black and Brown foster parents to gain the training and understanding they need to be successful with their children.” Overall I think that April really tries to inspire people. She’s really good at her job because I thought I was inspired, but now I am even more.

Hearing April’s story is very inspiring. She is an incredible person who does so much for Black and Brown foster children. She has podcasts and a website, (https://aprildinwoodie.com/the-podcast) and works very hard every day to make a change. This was an incredible interview!

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On Thursday, Feb 24, 2022, Our group: Child Welfare, Foster Care, and Adoption, interviewed April Dinwoodie (JuneinApril) about her experience in being adopted, and the issues in the foster care system today. April Dinwoodie was born to Helen June and put into temporary foster care immediately after. Helen already had 3 children and did not know if she would be able to care for another. April was adopted soon after by the Dinwoodies, who badly wanted a daughter. Her parents requested any child no matter the race, they would gladly take her in. April lived with her adopted family on a little farm in New England. She was the only biracial kid in her town. She was the only one with brown skin and thick curly hair. She spent her early days playing with her siblings outside and running around. Her difference never bothered her, that is until she had to go to school. She was treated differently, as an outsider. She would get lots of microaggressions and hurtful comments. Sometimes it was implicit, other times not. Most people didn’t notice, not even her parents. Her parents treated her the same as all her other siblings, but sometimes April felt that she wanted to be treated differently, like braiding her hair instead of trying to brush it out. Her blackness was being erased. It’s not widely understood that foster children often need different things than non-adoptive/foster children.
April began the search for her birth mother in her 20s. This was a very emotional experience because her mother did not want to be in contact with her. It felt like a double rejection. To be pushed away for a second time. April decided that she didn’t want anyone else to be as sad as she was, so she started a program. Her first program focused on getting mentors for foster children whom they could relate to. The mentors all had been involved in the foster care system as a child in some way. April also talked to us about many current problems. Yearly, there are over 400,000 in the foster care system. 25% of those children are currently waiting to be adopted, the others have the option of going back to their families. Most families only want babies, as they are easier to manage. Older children are more likely to have experienced and remembered some kind of trauma. This can be very daunting for parents. There is currently also a lack of available parents. Data strongly shows that black and brown children are involved and affected astronomically by the foster care system. Black children make up 23% out of 436,000 children in the foster care system currently. African Americans only make up 14% of the U.S. population. Black and brown children are also three times less likely to be adopted than their white counterparts.
April said that in her opinion, the biggest thing that isn’t working in the foster care system is listening. Adults do not listen to kids, especially teenagers. Professionals need to listen to the children’s needs because they are aware of their emotions. They have the right to say what they want their futures to look like. It is so common for adults to tell children and adolescents that they don’t really know what they want. The foster care also moves children around too much. This causes a lot of stress on children. When children do not feel that they are in a comfortable and stable home, it increases their feelings of rejection and low self worth. Children need to be valued more. Most foster children aren’t told that they are wanted, and that they have worth. It literally is not in the social security worker’s pay grade. Social security workers are overworked and do not get paid nearly enough. They don’t have the time, training, or energy to really commit to cases, and keep in mind the feelings of the children they are trying to help.
The foster care system is something that is really untalked about. It’s also something that is shamed. “We think we cant have more than one family.” What April is saying is that it’s considered shameful to be a foster kid. All of them are made to think that they aren’t wanted or that their parents don’t want them by society. More focus needs to be put on children’s well-being, to try and reduce and heal the trauma that affects all of them.

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On February 24 2022 we had the honor of meeting with April Dinwoodie. This person is an activist. She has her own podcast and is an influencer to see that all children but especially brown and black children make it into loving and supportive homes.

In 2021 22.75% of children in foster care were Black/colored. In 2016 57,000 children were adopted out of foster care 49% wight 22%latino 17% African American Wight foster youth are almost 40% more likely to get a job compared to black youth these are all reasons why it is much harder for black children in foster care and why there are a lot more boundaries and things to hold them back

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On Thursday, February 24, 2022, our social justice group was honored to meet with April Dinwoodie, a former marketing executive who now works as a podcaster and influencer to help Black and Brown foster children find safe and loving homes. April is Black/Bi-Racial and was adopted into a white family. She shared her thoughts and experiences about the inequities in the foster care and adoption systems.

April June Dinwoodie was born in Boston, Massachusetts to Helen June. April has no information about her biological father. Helen could not care for her daughter, so April was put into foster care for a few months and later adopted. April’s adoptive parents (parent’s of experience) had three biological children, but they wanted a daughter, so they adopted April.

April was named, June, by her birth mother after her biological grandmother, however her parents of experience named her, April. Neither of these names is the month she was actually born which is October. “June” became April’s middle name, and she adopted her family of experiences’ last name, Dinwoodie. April now has a podcast called “Born in June, Raised in April,” a title that reflects her two names.

Coming into the Dinwoodie family was a welcoming experience for April, although she was the only adopted and Black/Bi-Racial child in the family. She felt different from her siblings of experience because of her race, but her family did not treat her differently despite her differences. April felt accepted at home, but once she got to middle school, she started to get bullied by her peers. Growing up in a predominately white environment as a Black/Bi-Racial girl was hard, and April had to protect herself. Her parents were not aware of what was happening and they did not share the same racial experiences as her. April felt stuck and didn’t know who to talk to about the bullying at school. She encountered lots of racism as she grew up, so this sparked an interest in making change for other kids like her who were going through similar experiences.

When April was in her 20s, she wanted to look for her birth mother, Helen, but Helen refused to meet her. April was heartbroken. It felt as if she had a “double rejection” because her birth mother didn’t accept her when she was born and later rejected her when she was a grown adult. April’s sadness and anger inspired her to start making change for other children so that they could reunify with their birth parents.

There are 200,000 children in foster care every year. Black and Brown foster children are always represented disproportionally than their white counterparts, and Black and Brown children stay in foster care for longer. Adoption agencies claim to “not see color” when finding homes for children, although race is a key factor in the adoption process. April believes that there should be more parents to adopt Black and Brown children. She thinks that all parents should be trained the same way as adoption parents. Parents must listen to their children and understand what is best for their future. April wants to help all Black and Brown foster parents to gain the training and understanding they need to be successful with their children.

Hearing April story is very inspiring. She is an incredible person who does so much for Black and Brown foster children. She has podcasts and a website, (https://aprildinwoodie.com/the-podcast) and works very hard every day to make change. This was an incredible interview!

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On February 10 2022 we had the honor of meeting with Jenny and Keven Samuelson about their experience with adoption and the trials and tribulations of it. for jenny and Keven adopted from birth they adopted two children two girls it is different from adoption through foster care I would say it is easier than through foster care because you don’t have to get a foster license

their proses was hard though especially because they were in a different state so they signed up for the adoption process through and organization the had to get there months of training then they could adopt they had a bunch of home visits then they basically say you are ready you can adopt the they send out basically your resume to parents then the parents pick who they want once you are picked you go and meet with mothers then you talk about the baby then when the mother goes into labor you get called into the hospital. this is there adoption story i am sure some are different but some might be the same or similar

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On February 9th, 2022 we met with Alessandra brunialti and Paul yager. These people were important to meet with because they fostered and adopted a classmate of mine and her brother. We met with them to talk about their story their story was amazing. and it took a very long time to get their children.

We learned a lot about how they became foster parents and adopted through foster care first you have to do training for 9 months to get certified for foster care. then they call you whenever sometimes in the middle of the night or really early in the morning then someone is placed into their care you have to take care of them the agencies main goal is to reunite the family and the child over anything but if they can’t the child goes up for adoption or stays in foster care this process happens over and over again every day

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On Thursday, February 10th, our group interviewed Jenny Kevin Samuelson. We talked about their adoption process, and their experiences adopting. They currently live in New York City with their two children. When they adopted their first child, they were living in Georgia. The foster laws there vary from those of New York. They had to go through a process to become certified to adopt. They had frequent home assessments and studies with a social worker. They also had to be thoroughly background checked for any criminal acts of any kind. Jenny and Kevin became licensed after three months of working fervently. They worked with a private organization that required the samuelson’s to put together a profile for birth parents to look at and decide if they wanted to send their child with them. The Samuelsons adopted their first child immediately from birth. Foster parents must have a certification to adopt babies born in a different state called the interstate compact. It must get approved before the parents can take their baby home. After the compact is approved, adoption can proceed. This however takes months. Social workers continue with monthly checkups until the child is officially adopted. When an adoption is approved, the parents receive the birth certificate and have full rights to their child. Until then, they are still legally bound to their parents or the organization. Private agencies tend to have a quicker adoption process than state agencies, taking only up to three months. Certain agencies can supply parents with emergency supplies like a car seat, or diapers.
Jenny and Kevin shared some more personal experiences and opinions on their experience. They talked about how babies are considered quite valuable. CPS and private organizations have all these processes in place to protect babies and children from being trafficked. The agencies always look for the safest outcome for a child even if it is not the quickest or easiest, although they are trying to do it as best they can. Fraud can happen, which is why there are always so many home visits and check-ins. Until the child is adopted, there is a lot of stress on the foster parents because there is no guarantee the baby is staying for good. The birth parents still have rights to their child, and can receive full custody again if they choose. Jenny noted that the social workers do a very thorough job with their check-ins. She sometimes felt under scrutiny by them, but she knew that they just had the child’s best interests in mind. Their agency did an organized job, however, with private organizations they can be a bit ruthless. They want to make adoptions final because that is the way they make their money. Jenny felt like at times she needed to be protective of her child’s birth mother because she was under a lot of pressure, and the agencies did not do much to comfort her.
Jenny and Kevin also talked about how there have been times when they have felt shame when their kids were babies. When they had to fly their first child back on the plane, after picking them up, they felt judged by the other people for bringing a newborn, but the other people didn’t understand the situation. There are also a lot of stereotypes about how a baby should be raised. It was sometimes hard having to feed their kids with formula instead of breast milk, and dealing with the judgments. They also faced judgments on the relationships they have with their kids. There is still a big stereotype about how families are supposed to look today. Real families around the world come in all shapes and sizes. Normal should no longer be thought of in one way. “Families go in different ways.” awareness needs to be raised about adopted families, and it needs to be normalized. We should stop treating it like a taboo. This may even encourage other families to adopt if we get rid of the stereotypes.

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After learning that one of our fellow classmates, Allie Samuelson, was adopted we asked if we could reach out to her parents to ask about her adoption. Then on Thursday, February 10, 2022, our social justice group met with Jenny and Kevin Samuelson. Jenny and Kevin adopted Allie and her sister, Zoe, at birth, and they shared their story about adopting two girls at birth.

Like many other women, Jenny had trouble getting pregnant and she and her husband wanted to start a family. At the time they were living in Atlanta, Georgia, at the time. In Atlanta, Jenny and Kevin lived on a block with 13 adopted children. When they thought they were interested in adopting, they asked some of their neighbors for some guidance on starting the adoption process. Soon after Jenny and Kevin reached out to an agency and created a family profile, so parents that were thinking about giving their child up for adoption could look at their information and decide if they wanted the family to care for their baby. A mother who lived in Virginia, choose Jenny and Kevin. When the mother was in labor, the day before Allie was born, they got a call that Allie’s birth mother was in labor so they had quickly flown out to Virginia. When they arrived at the hospital, Jenny and Kevin were able to be in the same room as the mother when Allie was born. Since Jenny and Kevin got such short notice before the birth of Allie, they did not have all the baby supplies they needed, and they were unprepared. Something that Jenny and Kevin mentioned was that they even had to borrow a car seat from an agency in Virginia to take Allie back from the hospital because they did not have one themselves.

Since Allie was adopted in a different state from the Jenny and Kevin they lived in, they had to follow a protacall called The Interstate Compact. The Interstate Compact is basically is a proticall that ensures that after the child is adopted, they are safe and well cared for all across states. After Allie was born, Jenny and Kevin had to stay in a hotel for a couple of days instead of going home after she was born while they awaited the Interstate compact to be approved. They discribed it as really hard to take care for a newborn baby in a hotel, then when they finally get approved they had to travel on a plane witha a new-born baby. Jenny quoted that, “everyone judges you when you bring your new-born baby on the plane and they want to tell you what and what not to do with your child, but they really don’t know your full story.” Which I thought was really interesting beucase I didn’t really think about that part of their experience as foverever parents.

After getting home safely, Allie settled in very well with Jenny and Kevin. Jenny and Kevin clearly imformed Allie about her birth parents and answered any questions she would have around the topic. Later, Jenny and Kevin adopted Zoe, Allies sister through the same process. Jenny and Kevin are still in contact with family members from Allie’s and Zoe’s biological families. Allie even has seven biological siblings, one of them is her sister who Jenny and Kevin are in close contact with and they visit and see quite often. After hearing about these amazing experiences about Jenny and Kevin adopting Allie, we were all fascinated beucase it really gave us insight on how the adoption system work.

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On Wednesday, February 9th, We met with Alessandra Brunialti, and Paul Yager, who are LREI parents at the school. We had an in-depth conversation on their experience in fostering and adopting. They adopted their children from Sheltering Arms; Child and Family Services. They currently live in New York with their two children. They entered the system’s process almost a decade and a half ago.

It was no surprise to learn that fostering and adopting is no easy task. There are many ways that a person can adopt or foster. You can adopt kids through the state, or privately through a non-governmental organization. Alessandra and Paul adopted both their children through the state of New york. To first become a foster parent, one must register for a license, which process takes around nine months. Background checks, fingerprinting, and criminal records all need to be collected during the process, and home and family inspections also occur. This also must be completed to renew the license granted annually. While taking care of a child, home inspections happen once a month, and search the house to make sure the house is clean, there are working fire alarms, there is food in the refrigerator, and proper rooms.

Agencies prepare families to become immediate foster parents. They must be ready to take in a child who was taken into foster care as quickly as possible. When a child gets removed from their home, the city looks at lists of available foster homes and calls them. Not much information is given except for sex, religion, and disability. The day after the phone call the agency comes and delivers the baby to them. Frequent checkups must be done with the agency.

The main focus of CPS and many other organizations is to reunite them with their birth families. These matters are taken to court and a judge decides if the birth parents are stable enough to be reunited. The baby, mother, and other parents get attorneys to represent them, but foster parents do not. Birth families only have 15 months to prove that they can create a safe and supportive home for their children. If not with their parents, CPS often tries to seek out family members who can take them in. During and after the child is being fostered, the birth parents have visitation rights which both they, and the foster parents need to uphold. This is a parental requirement if they want to obtain full custody again. Other requirements are: obtaining a stable source of income, receiving help and getting clean for any addictions or mental illnesses, and attending prenatal classes. The parents can terminate parental rights if they cannot meet the requirements for full custody. All of these requirements are valid in the state of New York, but many states have very different requirements.

Alessandra and Paul also shared a lot of very valuable facts and insight on their opinions on the way the foster care and adoption process and the system work; they note that poverty and extreme living conditions really hit the system the hardest. It is far less common for abuse to be the reason for removal and is most commonly because of neglect and the inability to support a child. They also talked about how the three reasons a child will go into the system are: abuse (rare), neglect (more common), and abandonment (in some states it is legal to leave your child in front of a police station, fire station, or hospital and abandon your child). Another thing that we talked about were the parenting classes and techniques learned before becoming a foster parent. Alessandera mentioned how she and Paul learned some very important parenting skills, like how to do CPR and other important things. She said that she thinks every parent should take these classes.
“anyone can become a parent.”
We agreed that parenting classes should be more available and encouraged for new parents. This would be a major step in preventing the problem, rather than just patching the cracks of the foster care system.

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On Wednesday, February 9, 2022, our social justice group had the opportunity to meet with two amazing LREI parents, Alessandra Brunialti and Paul Yager, parents of Carmen Yager, an 8th grader. Alessandra and Paul were able to foster then adopted both Carmen and her brother, Neo, through an organization called Sheltering Arms. After learning about Sheltering Arms from Alessandra and Paul, and researching online after the interview, we learned that organization strives and tries to find all children safe and good homes. They also work closely with their communities to address any social inequity in their.

Alessandra and Paul adopted both Carmen and Neo through the state. First, Carmen and Neo were first fostered. In order to foster, Alessandra and Paul had to become licensed by the state of New York. The process took nine months and some of the steps that were included to get licensed were background checks, home inspections, references from others. They even had to send their fingerprints to the FBI. Alessandra and Paul had to renew their license every year as well. We asked Alessandra and Paul if the process was annoying, hard, and complicated. Their response was that they were actually glad, “The process was hard because that means that these kids are going into really good families and that’s all we want. So we powered through and got two amazing children.” Carmen started being fostered by Alessandra and Paul when she was three months old and then Alessandra and Paul adopted her parents on June __, 2010. And that is now celebrated as her homecoming. Homecoming basically celebrates the anniversary when a child gets officially adopted. Carmen quotes it as “Her second birthday”

Before getting Carmen and Neo, Alessandra and Paul got very little information on them both. They got to know the child’s sex, religion, and whether or not they have disabilities or medical concerns beforehand and that is it. AsC armen and Neo grew up, Alessandra and Paul gave them more information about their birth parents. According to Alessandra and Paul, being honest and accurate is the best way to be when telling your foster kids about their biological parents because you never want to reverse information in the future or develop trust issues.

It was so amazing to talk to Alessandra and Paul about their experience being foster parents and then becoming adoptive parents. Personally, I learned so much about the system just from them, and know im excited to learn about more experiences.

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On Monday, February 7th, 2022, our Social Justice group met with some amazing staff at New Alternatives for Children (NAC). The people we interviewed included Arlene Goldsmith (Executive Director), Bobbi Nathanson (Director of Volunteers, Student Internships, & Community Relations), Carola Haberly (Senior Director of Prevention Services), Carla Riccobono (Senior Director of Foster Care & Adoption Services), and Paris Robins (Foster Parent Recruitment Supervisor). NAC (New Alternatives for Children) is a great organization that helps kids with special needs and disabilities find homes in the child welfare system. The organization mostly helps kids that may have, but are not limited to autism, diabetes, HIV/AIDS, cerebral palsy, asthma palsy, brittle bone disease, and many more. NAC’s initial goal is to reunite families, but sometimes that does not happen. All NAC wants is to find these wonderful kids’ homes with parents that will help them thrive.

NAC has two locations in New York. One is in the Bronx in and they have one in Manhattan in the south midtown area. Arlene Goldsmith, the executive director at NAC. Founded the company in 1981. She has been helping children find homes for 80 years! A really important quote that was super powerful that Arlene said was, “a child’s history does not define their destiny.” This quote spoke to me because it really represents how the foster care system can’t change kids’ past but they can try to create a better future for them. Some of the other staff at NAC that we talked to have been there for quite a while as well. Paris Robins who is the Foster Parent Recruitment Supervisor at NAC told us some of the things they look for in foster parents.

After an hour interview with NAC, I learned so much about NAC and what they do. We also expanded our knowledge of the child welfare system in New York City. NAC also gave us an idea to do a school supplies drive to donate so kids can have school supplies until the end of the year.

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On Wednesday, February 9, 2022, our group was honored to meet with Alessandra Brunialti and Paul Yager, parents of Carmen Yager, an 8th grader at LREI. Alessandra and Paul adopted both Carmen and her brother, Neo, through an organization called Sheltering Arms. Sheltering Arms is an incredible organization that helps to find all children safe and loving homes so that they can succeed and thrive. They address the effects of social inequity in communities in NYC and help with the development of all children, their families, and their communities. Alessandra and Paul shared their story about the foster care and adoption process.

Carmen came into Alessandra and Paul’s care when she was six weeks old, and she was adopted by them when she was three years old. Alessandra and Paul were required to get licensed in order to adopt children, and the licensing process took nine months, the amount of time it takes for a woman to go through child birth. In order to get licensed, they had to do background checks, home inspections to ensure that their home was sustainable for children, and they even had to send their fingerprints to the FBI for inspection. It was a long process and they had to renew their licenses every year.

Agencies tell foster parents very little about the child before they meet the foster parents including their sex, religion, and whether or not they have disabilities or medical concerns. Carmen’s parents only knew this information when Carmen came into their home, but they got to know her and eased the transition so that everyone would feel comfortable. Also, Carmen had weekly visits with her birth mother which was a requirement in the agency.

Alessandra and Paul adopted Carmen’s brother, Neo, two and a half years after Carmen. They explained how since they moved to Los Angeles for a year, the adoption process took longer because there were different state regulations. However, the adoption process was smoother and easier the second time because Alessandra and Paul already had their licenses.

As Carmen and Neo grew up, Alessandra and Paul gave them more information about their birth parents. According to Alessandra and Paul, being honest and accurate is the best way to be when telling your foster kids about their biological parents because you never want to reverse information in the future or develop trust issues. “Homecoming” is the day that Carmen was adopted by Alessandra and Paul and it is like a second birthday. Birthdays can be hard for foster kids because they don’t always have the chance to connect with their birth parents.

It was very interesting to hear Alessandra and Paul’s story about adopting Carmen and Neo. It shows that there are parents in the world who are willing to help children find safe homes and provide care for kids. The world needs more of them.

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On February 7 2022 I had the pleasure of meeting with Bobbi, Arlene, Carola, Carla, and Paris. These people all have different roles at New Alternatives for Children (NAC). This organization is based in New York City. These people are important to my topic because they specialize in special needs cases like children with autism.NAC was the first child welfare agency in New York State to serve children in family-based care who have dual diagnoses.

I learned a lot from this meeting. I learned how they kept up their communication with families through the covid 19 pandemic. I also learned about how they put their high-needs kids into foster care. and the age range of all the kids that are adopted and fostered. I also learned that NAC has there own staff of doctors to help the kids this was quite an amazing experience

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Our Group Met with The New Alternatives For Children (NAC). We interviewed 4 people: Arlene Goldsmith (Executive Director), Carla Riccobono (Director of Foster care and Adoption), Bobbi Nathanson (Director of Volunteers, Student Internships & Community Relations), and Paris Robbins (Foster Parent Recruitment Supervisor). This organization is partnered with ACS and is working incredibly hard to be there for every child in need throughout the boroughs. Their organization was started over 40 years ago by Arlene herself after spending 25 years in social work, to focus on children living in hospitals for longer than they needed to because of disabilities they had. their parents were unprepared to take care of them themselves or didn’t know what needed to be done. We learned a lot of interesting facts, for example, we know that children cannot be removed from their family’s household until taking the case to family court. Removal must be deemed necessary by a judge. We also learned that the children that are hardest to place are teens. the program mostly focuses on kids with disabilities, and they noted that it is definitely a challenge to get children with more challenging disabilities with more special needs and attention adopted. because of this, it is also harder to keep siblings all together if there is a big family, or multiple or all of the kids have special needs. Housing can also affect this because it can be hard to find people who own a big enough space to take in many kids.
NAC works extremely hard to get children back with their birth parents as soon as possible, preferring to put foster children with Kinship parents. It is shown that children staying with relatives makes visiting their parents easier, and they generally have a better time with someone who is related. of course, not all children have relatives available to foster them. Non-kinship foster parents go through an extensive training process. Many of them already have pre-existing experience with medical or mental care.
I definitely learned a lot through this interview. there was one quote that I left with that really stuck with me: “statistically parents who pertain optimism succeed the most when fostering.” They don’t succeed because they think it is the right thing to do, or if it has anything to do with their religion. The foster parents that usually succeed are the ones that truly believe they can make a difference in their foster child’s life, and are willing to put in time and effort for their success and well-being.

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On Monday, February 7th, 2022, our Social Justice group was honored to meet with staff at New Alternatives for Children (NAC). We interviewed Arlene Goldsmith (Executive Director), Bobbi Nathanson (Director of Volunteers, Student Internships, & Community Relations), Carola Haberly (Senior Director of Prevention Services), Carla Riccobono (Senior Director of Foster Care & Adoption Services), and Paris Robins (Foster Parent Recruitment Supervisor). NAC is an incredible organization that helps children who are in foster care, supports foster children with special needs, trains foster parents to become good caretakers for their children, helps children when going through the adoption process, helps to reunite families who have been spilt apart, and overall, helps all children find safe and loving homes. NAC continues to have a positive impact on many foster kids’ lives. NAC’s primary goal is unification, reuniting all foster kids with their biological families.

The NAC staff had many interesting things to say. Arlene has worked at NAC for 40 years and started the organization in 1981, when she saw that children were growing up in hospitals because they had special needs that their parents weren’t addressing. She thought that this was wrong so she started NAC as a way to help all foster children experience a great childhood despite their past traumas. One thing that Arlene said that really stuck out to us was, “a child’s history does not define their destiny.” This statement means that even though many children go through hardships as they are involved in the foster care system, nothing prevents them from reaching the goal of finding a permanent, safe home.

The other staff: Bobbi, Carola, Carla, and Paris, gave insight about how the foster care system works, how children’s special needs are addressed at NAC, and the complicated process of finding all children homes. They explained that NAC has many separate clinics and activities that help foster children to experience the best childhood possible.

All of this information helped us to reflect on our own childhoods and understand how much we take for granted as kids who are lucky enough to attend school and live in safe home environments with parents and siblings. We loved hearing from NAC and they have inspired us to organize our own school drive collecting school supplies for foster children. This was a wonderful interview!

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Yesterday I presented with my Social Justice group about our topic. We deeply researched the basics and some of the foundations of the child welfare systems in New York. We found some really interesting facts and statistics about the number of children in foster care or even involved welfare systems. Our group worked really well together and I thought that the presentation went really smoothly.

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Last Friday, my group presentated an overview presentation on our Social Justice Topic: Child Welfare Systems: Foster Care and Child Abuse/Neglect. Our group worked together and we all learned a lot. It was really interesting to learn more about how the Covid-19 pandemic had major effects on Child Welfare systems. I really enjoyed presenting and I am excited to learn more. Here is a short summary of what I learned about the Foster Care system:
Foster care is a system in which a child is placed in a home (either a group home or with a private state-certified caregiver) because the child can no longer live with their biological parents, often due to cases of child abuse or neglect. Foster parents are responsible for providing
safe home environments and care for their
children.
I am excited to continue learning and researching about my topic with my group!

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last week in school my group presented a social justice project presentation. This was our first attempt at sharing what we lawned when we read three articles. Me and my teammates all did an amazing job on this presentation. this is a very sad topic and its hard to learn about

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Last week in school, my group presented our social justice presentation 101. this was our first attempt at sharing initial research with our peers. I was a little nervous because our slideshow was so long, and we did not want the other students to get annoyed because it was so long. I have a great team, nonetheless, and we put in a lot of work. I think child welfare is a problem that isn’t talked about enough, especially the discrimination in the system. More people need to speak out about this problem. I feel like researching this has been a challenge because all I have found are statistics and not individual experiences. Our group has recently received an email from the organization: New Alternatives for Children. I am very excited and we are able to speak to the executive director!

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