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The challenges foster youth face can also serve as the source of their strength.

JUSD’s team of caring educators works hard to foster hope by helping students value their strength and resilience, showing them empathy and grace, and connecting them with resources available to help them move toward a promising future. Targeted programs and resources are available to foster youth year-round and are highlighted in May, which is National Foster Youth Awareness Month.

“We're making sure that we’re creating those safe spaces and building those trusting relationships with them, when often these student populations are not getting that access,” said Mariana Lopez Ramos, JUSD Foster and McKinney-Vento Counselor. “They go through such difficult circumstances…we need to embrace them. We need to make them feel seen, and we want to make sure that we hear them. I want the general population to see their potential and their resilience, to empathize but not pity.”

JUSD serves 162 foster youth. These students encounter challenges that can interfere with their academic success. JUSD’s team of counselors and liaisons, available at every JUSD campus, helps to connect these students with the support they need to be successful. 

“Our foster students, they’re very, very resilient…they have this motivation in them, but a lot of them, because of all of the things that they go through, they need extra compassion, extra support and grace,” said Casie Mann, Student Management and Accountability Counselor at Patriot High School.

 

Students are connected with liaisons at their schools who can help them find help for a variety of needs: access to mental health supports, information about graduation credit supports and post-secondary education programs, resources for basic needs such as food and clothing, and more. They also find a supportive community of adults and peers whom they can lean on when needed. 

“A lot of times, the students who are in foster care are not aware of the different resources that we as a district can provide and the resources that the community can provide to them to help them navigate their journey in foster care,” said Olga Alferez, JUSD Director of Educational Equity.

“It’s important that we have tailored services and supports for our foster youth because often they live in such unstable environments that we want to make sure we’re nurturing these youth,” Ms. Lopez Ramos added.

Services available to foster youth were recently highlighted at the district’s first JUSD EmpowerHER Spring event for JUSD female foster youth. Organizers hope to hold a similar event for other foster youth in the future. At the April event, students heard from peers and educators, were connected with a wide variety of resources and services, and had an opportunity to see that they were not alone. That feeling of loneliness is something student panelist Gemini understands.

“There was a point in my life where I gave up, and I thought that I was the only one who went through what I went through. She added that she hoped she was able “to let (other students) know that they can still try, and there’s hope out there.”

Challenges at home, court dates, frequent moves, and other issues can lead to absenteeism or difficulty in school, for example.

“Sometimes school is just not really our priority,” Gemini said. “There’s other stuff that goes on. Sometimes school can be too much for us. Just be patient and understanding.”

​The Riverside County Office of Education is facilitating the development of an app that will make those resources even easier for students to find. Gemini and other foster youth gave critical input that will be used to develop the app, which will be used across Riverside County, and potentially the state of California. 

“It’s important for our educators to hear from our foster youth because they are the ones with the richness in their lived experience, and they’re the ones who can best guide us to how to best support them.” Ms. Lopez Ramos said. “When I see students being vocal, speaking up, or at least helping one another, it just gives me such joy.”

“There’s so much value in their untold stories.”