Being removed from your home is always stressful. Youth in foster care often have few personal belongings and carry the items they do have in trash bags as they are shuffled from place to place. Very often sheer survival is the ultimate goal.
As a society, we stereotype all teens as difficult, selfish, or obnoxious. Teens in the foster care system carry an added burden of past abuses, disappointments, and fears. Teens in the foster care system need extra support and stability in order to overcome their past and thrive but older youth are more likely to be placed in institutional placements like group homes. These placements are the least family-like environments and don’t usually allow a teen to form strong bonds with reliable adults.
Foster Care Statistics from the AFCARS Report for FY 2010:
- As of September 30, 2010, there were 33,993 youth aged seventeen years old in the foster care system and 31,667 youth aged sixteen years old in the foster care system in the United States.
Packaged For Success™ is not just a portfolio development program – it is a brand – my lifestyle. I founded The Teen Toolbox because I am my client. Through the Packaged For Success Program I deliver the customer service and support that I wanted to receive. I created programs and workshops that were not available to me as a teen.
Over the last five years that my daughter, JaMai, has organized her Pack-A-Purse Drive she has collected, sorted, and delivered a total of 951 purses and toiletries to teenage girls in homeless shelters, group homes, foster homes, and community programs. The annual Pack-A-Purse Drive was her brainchild – it spoke directly to her life as a teen girl. This year my nephew finally said what many people have probably been thinking – “What about the boys”. (I was actually surprised it took him this long to ask.)
May is National Foster Care Awareness Month. This year during the month of May we WILL take care of the boys. We will launch the Pack-A-Backpack Drive in May 2012 to collect backpacks filled with toiletries/personal care items for teen boys in group homes and foster homes. Our goal for this first year is to collect 40 filled backpacks and deliver them to four organizations.
The Adoption and Foster Care Analysis and Reporting System (AFCARS) numbers have consistently shown a slightly greater percentage of boys than girls in foster care.
If you’re like me, you encounter children in various public places that very loudly express their restlessness, boredom, hunger, or anger. My running joke is that I’m going to offer a presentation on how to properly pack a diaper bag before you take your child to the doctor’s office, church, mall, auto repair shop and generally out in public. Then it all hilariously came back to me – I DID do a presentation on how to pack a diaper bag over 15 years ago!
This map has a starting point
But no set destination
The vehicle must navigate unknown territory
The road signs are plentiful
The speed limit increases
Straight ahead a sudden detour
The vehicle takes the new road
Lovely scenery
A more pleasant ride
You must choose the destination
You are the vehicle
The road trip is your life
By Nicki Sanders
(c) 2006-2012
The Road Trip Workshop will serve as an introduction to personal development. Through interactive activities participants will discover their strengths and assets, recognize road blocks, and examine their support system as they travel on their personal success journey. Bring our workshop to your group today.
Nicki Sanders, MSW, Chief Visionary Officer
The Teen Toolbox provides youth portfolio development and civic engagement and academic enrichment opportunities to help teens set goals for life after high school and create a road map to reach those goals through its PACKAGED FOR SUCCESS™ Programs.
Packaged is a common theme in my programs, services, and blog posts — Packaged For Success™, Pack-A-Purse. Being ready and/or prepared is a common theme in my life. I think it’s part of my DNA. I’m drawn to news stories and movies where people survive for days in the wilderness or in a blizzard. I will watch the weather channel for hours. Recently I became a Disaster Mobilization Center Volunteer for my county. The Volunteer Training and Coordinator asked me what interested me in volunteering and I couldn’t think of one specific event. I’ve always known that I would somehow be involved in the emergency preparedness field but I wasn’t sure when or how.
One of the most important questions asked of Disaster Mobilization Center Volunteers is “do you have an emergency kit”. My answer was “of course”. My home first aid kit is always stocked and I travel with a trial size first aid kit. Extra batteries and flashlights are in each area of my home. I change my emergency food and clothing supplies with the seasons. And yes, I even do the same in my car. Did I mention that I always have a pair of tennis shoes in my trunk and flat shoes under my desk in case I need some relief from a beautiful pair of high heels?
March is National Women’s History Month. Each year National Women’s History Month employs a unifying theme and recognizes national honorees whose work and lives testify to that theme. Women’s Education – Women’s Empowerment is the theme for National Women’s History Month 2012. The six women who help illustrate how ethnicity, region, culture, and race relate to Women’s Education – Women’s Empowerment are:
- Emma Hart Willard, Women Higher Education Pioneer
- Charlotte Forten Grimke, Freedman Bureau Educator
- Annie Sullivan, Disability Education Architect
- Gracia Molina Enriquez de Pick, Feminist Educational Reformer
- Okolo Rashid, Community Development Activist and Historical Preservation Advocate
- Brenda Flyswithhawks, American Indian Advocate and Educator
I am a proponent of education and I love national observances that we can use as teachable moments. Most of our youth do not know who the women being honored for National Women’s History Month. (I don’t even know who all of these women are.) I am painfully aware that for some of our youth, their role models and mentors are entertainers and athletes — I incorporate this fact into my overall goal setting strategy with youth. I also introduce books and authors that I feel have traveled on an inspiring journey. Despite my use of these tactics, I know that it is important that youth also have role models and mentors that they can connect with in person, by telephone, and even online.
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