Kentucky is doing more to support foster care, but kids need your help too

Tears got here to my eyes as I lately examine a fifteen-year-old boy sitting in a residential facility the place he had been for 14 months. Right here was a boy who merely needed nothing greater than to search out the protection, love, and luxury of a household. It was one in all 20 such stories I learn that morning.

As we depart the month of Could – Foster Care Consciousness Month – we should proceed to give attention to caring for Kentucky’s most weak populations. I’m happy with the latest work Kentuckians have finished to deal with the well being and wellness of our households, together with the commonwealth’s bipartisan assist for Senate Invoice 8 — launched by Senator Julie Raque Adams (District 36—R) and signed by Governor Andy Beshear (D) earlier this 12 months — that will increase sources for little one welfare initiatives.

I additionally welcome the more and more strong dialogue and enhanced consciousness amongst our leaders and inside communities all through the Commonwealth relating to our must recruit extra social staff and improve their wages whereas additionally closing gaps in care for people and households needing substance use and psychological well being providers.

At Kentucky MENTOR, a foster care group, we imagine that youngsters thrive in household settings, and we offer at-risk youth with nurturing helps in a loving dwelling the place they’ll heal and transfer ahead. Over the previous 12 months, we’ve leveraged our modern care mannequin to acknowledge and reply to the indicators, signs, and dangers of trauma with the intention to higher assist the wants of the youngsters and households we serve. The outcomes are steady placements for 90 % of the youth discharged from our program and making a path for 90 % of them to satisfy their remedy targets. Most significantly, each little one in our program reported feeling protected, accepted, supported, and happy with the providers they obtain.

For this reason I’ve devoted my 27-year profession to empowering others open their hearts and minds to the thought of adjusting the long run via foster care. I can’t think about a extra rewarding expertise than to organize and assist households who change a toddler’s life.

Because the Commonwealth continues to deal with the wants of our kids and households, we’re proud to be a part of that momentum, offering top quality providers, supporting our devoted state and native leaders, and empowering Kentuckians – such as you — with instruments and sources to vary a toddler’s life. You have the facility to be the change you want to see on the earth — proper right here, in our beloved Kentucky.

Similar to Daniel Boone proclaimed, we imagine “Heaven should be a Kentucky type of place.” One during which all of our kids have a house and household that loves them for who they’re and who they’ll grow to be.

Kenneth J. Williams is the state director of Kentucky MENTOR, a foster care company in Louisville.