Welcome to our segment to expand on the quotes featured in The Black Foster Youth Handbook: 50+ Lessons I learned to successfully age-out of foster care and holistically heal
I am your host, Ángela Quijada-Banks & so excited you've decided to join the journey toward Soulful Liberation!
“What does it mean to succeed? Is it easily labeled by the cliché of going to college followed by an excursion of unlimited educational milestones to a doctoral degree? Is it the white picket fence, lavish outings, and marriage with 2.5 children? Is that truly the goal? Well, for some, but for me, it’s not exactly in that order. My life has been a sum of one of a lifetime experiences, travel, trauma, healing, intense love, and many many lessons. Some say I have reached success already, but for me there is always another rock to discover, another idea to be birthed, another feeling to be understood and another breath to be meditated upon. Life is a journey, not a destination, and there is never a true end with success, if you set your mind on it.”
Foster Care is a whole other world that most of the world’s population knows little to nothing about. Many people do not know the very low statistics young people endure in order to successfully age-out of foster care.
Less than 5% of young people with the experience of foster care graduate post-secondary education. There are many youth who become prey to sex-trafficking or susceptible to suicide due to homelessness, mental health challenges and no support system. Now, couple the child welfare system with the element of racial injustices and the history of white supremacy and the topic may even become taboo.
Ángela Quijada-Banks, a woman of African and Indigenous descent has taken the liberty of giving back to these communities for a half a decade through advocacy, advisory and organizational training. Through her travels across the nation, speaking to congressional members, federal stakeholders and constituents of the foster care system she decided some sort of manual was needed to combat the shocking low success rates of young people with the background of foster care. This handbook is written to be supplemental to young people in foster care’s navigation through foster care and healing beyond it.
Supportive adults such as foster/resource parents, case managers, GALs, therapists and social workers will also find this to be helpful in their roles in young people’s lives. Success is possible regardless of where you come from, you just have to know where to look, who to trust and believe in the one person that can get you to the other side of pain and trauma, you.
Learn more about The Black Foster Youth Handbook here:
https://www.blackfostercareyouthhandbook.com/
Learn more about the mission of Soulful Liberation at www.soulfulliberation.com
Instagram: @souful_liberation