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PHILANTHROPIC: HOME BASE FAMILY website content

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HOME BASE FAMILY mentors youth in and aging out of foster care to become a part of a connected family that supports life long healing.

Founded by Mike Foster and LaVonne Roberts, HbF is a community for anyone who experienced foster care to age into, not out of a community. Both founders are passionate about TBRI ((Trust-Based Relational Interventions) and being a part of a lifelong healing journey. TBRI is based on a solid foundation of neuroscience research tempered with humanitarian principles developed by Dr. Karyn Purvis and Dr. David Cross at the TCU Institute of Child Development. It is a family based philosophy designed for anyone who has experienced relationship based traumas such as institutionalization, multiple foster care placements, maltreatment and/or neglect that supports healing environments. Today HbF is more than bricks and mortar, it’s a community that meets in homes, businesses and is actively engaged supporting it’s foster alumni with a goal to provide a home to some of the most difficult youth in our system who have not had their needs met. HbF offers programs and services that empower young people aging out of foster care ages 16-24 to work toward their GED or high school diplomas, learn job skills, pursue higher education and serve their communities by connecting them to affordable housing and sustainable employment so that they can transform their own lives and roles in society by sharing their success with others.

It is hard turning 18 - moving out, finding a job, considering college, but many kids exiting foster care do it alone without a lifeline to parents and family that helps most teens ease into independence. Every year approximately 25,000 young people experiencing foster care in America “age out” of our foster care system alone, without any enduring family relationships or community connections, usually at 18. Abruptly, after a childhood spent in a system that has made every important life decision for them, most often having spent their childhood on psychotropic medications as a means of behavioral management, they are on their own with no support network. Far too many children, their siblings, and families are traumatized by broken child welfare, mental health, juvenile justice and educational systems that fail to deliver a safe environment to thrive. Often, they are blamed for their failures and move from one unsuccessful placement to another, eventually leading disconnected lives. As a result, we have a foster care pipeline of 25,000 American youth heading out into the world annually with a trajectory for homelessness, incarceration, unemployment, early parenthood, lives of poverty and underachievement without a high school education or life skills to succeed on their own. Worst of all, their trajectory is to become another statistic - abusive, neglectful parents who perpetuate a never-ending cycle of trauma and failure. HomeBase Family believes it’s time to change that trajectory by welcoming anyone in need of a family to be a part of our family.

Homebase Family was formed to address one absolutely essential need:

WE ALL NEED A FAMILY

CORE PRINCIPLES

  • HbF is a supportive community that promotes life skills for youth aging out of foster care to succeed in pursuing vocational or high education to lead a self-sustainable connected life.
  • HbF gives back to our community by connecting and empowering one another so that we can grow individually and as a family through public service.
  • HbF believes in nurturing the soul and body. A core component - we break bread together, sharing meals, cultures and the art of cooking and learning about sustainable farming and promoting health-conscious lifestyles.
  • HbF celebrates and nurtures individual talents and passions so that we can each use our talents to help one another succeed.
  • HbF supports developing each individual’s voice to express their needs and to listen thoughtfully and mindfully to others needs.
  • HbF’s door is always open and there is always room for another plate at our table. Regardless of age or station in life, you are always a part of our family.
  • HbF believes we all have the ability to meet our own challenges and succeed in life when we are part of a healthy connected community that provides educational and experiential opportunities to thrive.
  • HbF nurtures the ability to ask for help and celebrates accepting help and the empowering grace that we all experience when helping one another.
  • HbF involves our youth, alumni and caregivers in advocating for system improvement and reform.

Aging-Out Stats

For eight years, researchers have followed about 600 young adults who aged out of the child welfare systems in Iowa, Wisconsin, and Illinois. The report finds that at age 23 and 24, former foster youth are more likely than their peers to be:

Unemployed — Less than half were employed.

Homeless — Almost 25 percent had been homeless since exiting foster care.

Pregnant — More than 75 percent of young women had been pregnant since leaving foster care.

Convicted of a crime — Nearly 60 percent of young men had been convicted of a crime, and more than 80 percent had been arrested.

Uneducated — Only 6 percent had a 2-year degree and only 2 percent had a 4-year degree.

The Midwest Evaluation of the Adult Functioning of Former Foster Youth (Midwest Study) is a longitudinal study that has been following a sample of young people from Iowa, Wisconsin, and Illinois as they transition out of foster care into adulthood. It is a collaborative effort involving Chapin Hall at the University of Chicago; the University of Wisconsin Survey Center; and the public child welfare agencies in Illinois, Iowa, and Wisconsin