Transitioning into Adulthood: A Personal Narrative

Ageing Out!!
Imagine if you will a beautiful sunny day. The sky is blue not a cloud in the sky, you have just woken from a night’s sleep. As you slowly set up in the bed your parents picked out for you, wearing your favorite p.js., and you look around your room wear on the walls are pictures of you, your parents, other relative, and you’re friends it hits you it’s your birthday and you are now eighteen-years old. OH the joy that feels you you’re an adult you rush to the kitchen where your mom is fixing your favorite breakfast, she tells you that the rest of your family is coming for supper. You think to yourself how wonderful it is to be you you’re loved, you’re safe, and you’re supported. No the flip side of this coin of life is much the

No matter the act the consequence is still the same here you are 18 and alone. By the end of the day you will find yourself on your own. If you are lucky you may have had a good caseworker who told you about the few programs out there for foster children who age out of the system and you have a place already lined up to live in, you have a part-time job, and the promise that you will stay in school and keep a 2.0 GPA so that you will qualify for the 1,200 dollars a month stipend. On the other hand, you may have ended up with a caseworker where you were just one of the 100 children they had to see each month and they did not even realize that you were turning 18 this month and if they did all they could think of is there goes one and I will have 5 more to take that slot. Say they did help get you set up with a program, not to mention your foster parents say you have to be out by lunch because the kid that is taking the bed you have slept in for the last five months

This program is as good and as bad as the foster care system that it sprang from. If you are blessed to get a good consular you stand a fighting chance, if you get one that is overworked or worse yet, just there to have a job, chances are slim you will be able to make it work in the program. This program requires youths to work so many hours, but don’t make more than 5,000 dollars a school year or their stipend is reduced, their stipend is 1,014 dollars a month. They do receive Medicare and a limited amount for housing I could not find the exact amount. In order to stay in the Road to Independence program youths must maintain a place of residence, a certain GPA, and employment. While I understand that this sounds like a great program, one must take into consideration that these are for the most part, 18 year-olds that more than likely have been in multiple foster and group homes, definitely came from an abusive or neglectful background, and more than likely have their own set of unique issues. They have probably not been taught how to manage money, sign a lease, no transportation of their own to get back and forth to jobs or school, or even filled out forms at the doctor’s office on their own. The training they are supposed to have comes from those same counselors, we mentioned before, so it may or may not have happened. Like all state and federally funded programs the Road to Independence has