Everybody Needs Someone, The Aging-Out of Foster Care Project By SalaamGarageNYC 2012 Cover photo by Ian Spanier Copyright © 2012 SalaamGarageNYC thought my life was over. I couldn’t be- writers and journalists volunteered their skills lieve this was what my life had become,” and time to tell these stories and to document said 27-year-old Krista James, who spent the efforts of young adults like Krista James, most of her adolescent years in and out Brandon Kolin, Shirley Newman, Dmitiry of the foster care system, and then lived Reibl, and more to emerge from the foster ON in multiple homeless shelters as a young adult. care system prepared to face the world and I IGrowing up, Krista was shuttled between live a safe and productive life. unfit relatives unable to care for her and a SalaamGarageNYC worked with You Got- series of foster and group homes. At 21, she ta Believe, a non-profit organization based found herself on her own. Feeling discour- in Coney Island, Brooklyn, and the Home- aged and distraught with life, Krista lived in lessness Prevention and Rapid Re-housing five different shelters over the course of four Program (HPRP) in Nassau County, Long years. “You feel like you’re at the bottom Island, to identify and connect with our sub- of the earth and everything is horrible and jects. These young people want to tell their messed up,” said Krista. stories to impact change in the system. Some, Krista’s experience is not unusual. This year, with the help of family, friends or loved ones, approximately 1,000 youth will age out of the have successfully adapted to life on their own; foster care system in New York City alone. Na- some continue to struggle. All have impor- tionally, 1 in 5 will become homeless; 1 in 4 tant experiences to share. will be incarcerated within two years of aging- We hope these stories inspire compassion out; about 50 percent of young women will and action. become pregnant within 1 year; and only half There are several specific goals SalaamGa- of all foster youth will graduate high school.* rageNYC is working to meet with the Aging- Everybody Needs Someone, The Aging-Out of Out of Foster Care Project: Foster Care Project, is a compilation of stories • Prevent recently aged-out young adults and photographs of subjects from New York from becoming homeless former foster youth City and Long Island that goes beyond these • See the number of youth aging out of the fos- troubling statistics and puts a name, a face, ter care system drop further as a result of fewer and a personal story to the challenges of tran- foster youth in the system in the first place and sitioning into adulthood after years spent in more older teen and tween adoptions foster care. It confronts one central question • See less poverty in the aged-out population about the foster care system: What happens because more aged-out youth find the sup- when youth age out of the system? port and resources needed to complete high INTRODUCT Our society expects foster kids to be fully school, pursue a higher education and receive self-reliant as soon as they turn 21. The real- effective job training ity is that most foster youth find themselves • Benefit effective local non-profit organizations without the necessary skills and resources to by raising awareness and in-turn more funding live independently. How, then, do they pre- for their good work. Local organizations like pare for self-sufficiency? Is there any extended You Gotta Believe, who work non-stop to fa- support and guidance beyond the aging-out cilitate adoptions and placement in permanent point that they can rely on? families for aged-out and soon to age-out foster This book and the larger Aging-Out of Fos- youth in Long Island and New York City. ter Care Project have been produced by Sa- You can help us meet these goals. Volunteer, laamGarageNYC, a humanitarian media or- donate, mentor, foster, adopt or just spread ganization that produces storytelling projects the word. Big or small, every little bit of help whose goal is to inspire positive social change. does make a difference. A team of more than 25 New York City-based professional photographers, videographers, - Daphne Eviatar with Maggie Soladay *Statistics from The Children’s Aid Society 2/28/2005, www.childrensaidsociety.org/issues/aging-out-foster-care Photo by Matthew Furman 3 “You can’t let what held you back before hold you back now… I’m limitless.” — Fekri Fekri By Tommy Hallissey Photography by Bruce Byers 5 ithout a word, dured traumatic upbringings, must lar to half of the foster youth who have In lieu of college, he has been work- close friends aged out of foster care in Without work, family or social Fekri’s disarm- transition from a system full of famil- aged out of the system, has been un- ing part-time for the Coney Island December 2011. “He’s been there when structure locally, the odds are stacked ing, toothy iar structure to the cold realities of in- able to land full-time employment. “It’s non-profit You Gotta Believe. An or- I need someone to talk to and vice ver- against a 21-year-old former foster smile betrays dependent living. Roughly two-thirds quite apparent to me that former foster ganization that works to place older sa,” Daniel said in a phone interview. youth such as Fekri. “The consequenc- the suffer- of the 16,000 foster youth in America, children fare poorly in the job market,” and aged-out foster youth in perma- Fekri, who has limited contact with es of not effectively supporting foster ing he endured coming of age in the including Fekri, age out of the system said Richard Altman, executive director nent families. “You can’t let what held his biological family, said he feels very youth in their transitions to adulthood WNew York City foster care system. His without reuniting with their family or of the Jewish Child Care Association, you back before hold you back now,” much alone in New York. The added are serious,” according to the Urban crooked pearly whites hide the agony being adopted, according to a Septem- one of the city’s largest foster care agen- articulated Fekri. “I’m limitless,” he support from Daniel, whom he con- Future report. “Many foster youth slip of being sold into slavery in Tunisia at ber 2011 report by The Center for an cies. “Children in foster care are behind added with a smile. siders a brother, has not been enough from being minor wards of the state as the age of 5 for a mere $100. Without Urban Future. on every indicator for future employ- Fekri is fortunate among his peers. to keep him psychologically and spiri- children to adult wards of the state as parents to dote on him, Fekri has spent “I’ve been through hell and back,” ment success once they leave care.” According to a 2008 New York City tually afloat. prison inmates, welfare recipients or most of his formative years in loveless explained Fekri, who wore faded, Researchers have also found that Administration of Children’s Services Recently, Fekri sought out a recon- residents of homeless shelters.” foster homes run by such organiza- ripped jeans and a trendy white t- employment is a principal predictor and Department of Homeless Services nection with his family; however a Fekri and Daniel, on the other hand, tions as Little Flower Children and shirt. But, he said, his inner strength of success in the transition from the study, 21 percent of all youth ages 16 reunion has remained elusive because are lucky enough to have forged a mu- Family Services of New York. Now 21, fuels his drive to succeed when others structure of foster care to independent and older who left foster care in 2004 of a recent revolution in Tunisia. tually beneficial friendship that has Fekri lives in a subsidized South Bronx would have quit. “The intensity I’ve living. However, there are 14 million entered a DHS shelter within three Even though his family offered to pay helped both of them transition into the studio apartment. He is one of nearly been through is only a motive.” Americans competing for work today, years. “Their outcomes are not as the flight to his homeland, Fekri is freedom of adulthood. “It’s a stepping 1,000 youth forced to navigate life as Fekri, who has persevered through including those with more experience beautiful as this,” he said seated in his ashamed of sharing his experience in stone to full independence, or should a self-sufficient individual after aging- such obstacles as slavery, poverty, abuse than Fekri. As a result, Fekri has been spartan studio. the stigma-inducing American foster I say, being self-sufficient to the ex- out of the city’s foster system on the and solitude, now enjoys the gifts of forced to navigate his early days of in- Daniel, Fekri’s friend of 11 years, now system. “I don’t want to let my moth- treme,” Fekri explained, his gaze fixat- day of their first legal drink. his independence, including no direct dependence without a full-time job to lives in the same building on Melrose er know what happened,” he said. “I ed on the horizon outside the bay win- These youth, who often have en- supervision or curfew. Yet, Fekri, simi- anchor his life. Avenue in the South Bronx. These two don’t really need to put that on her.” dow of his first New York apartment.