There are a lot of the CASA volunteers who do one case (about 1-2 years) and then don’t do another. Covid really changed things because so many of the things we normally did were closed - library, swimming pools or splash pools, movies, anything indoors. It was a LONG, HOT summer last year! Dealing with schools was very difficult. Originally I was told about 2-4 hours per week but I’d do about 8 hours every other week just because of the distance from my house to where the kids were. Again, older kids might have been easier because I could contact them by phone. My kids were so sick of Zoom and online stuff because of school that they wanted in-person contact (and they were young kids).
By far the hardest part was writing the reports! I’ve been a lawyer for 40 years, I’ve written a lot of reports and pleadings, but nothing was ever good enough for my supervisors. I couldn’t say “She’s an active child who loves to climb.” How do I know that? Did I observe it, when did I observe it? Didn’t you say the same thing last report? How many ways are there to say 'She’s polite to adults I’ve seen her interact with?" and how many adults could I see her interact with since it was covid and we didn’t go anywhere with other adults? I was really, really frustrated at that part of it. I also didn’t like how the courtroom was run. There were people everywhere, no privacy, and I didn’t think the others were taking things seriously. Too much chitchat among the lawyers and even the judge.
Yes, I’m a control freak.
The kids were a delight. Loved seeing them and they were always excited to see me. That was an ego boost.
Thank you all again for this insightful, very helpful information! This second stage of life (after full-time work) seems like it has a lot of opportunities for service - trying to figure that aspect out and these stories/ideas were incredibly thought-provoking.
We did short term foster and respite for babies when my kids were grade school age. It was a great experience. Because we only intended to do short term, a lot of the common stresses associated with fostercare kind of rolled off our backs. I have also represented (as their lawyer) teens in care. It was probably the most meaningful thing I ever did in my life. Contrary to popular belief, many teens in care are absolutely amazing human beings with executive functioning skills that far exceed their peers. They have to have those to survive a turbulent childhood. You see the results of your labor right away with teens. I will say that we were by far the most upper class people in our fostercare class and it was noticeable in different standards of the minimum requirements for child rearing (like how many kids in a room, acceptable levels of medical and dental care). Temporary fostercare does involve a lot of appointments so its good to have someone not working full time. The one unanticipated problem was it was very hard to travel out of state. You had to jump through a ton of hoops for a weekend trip. Taking temp or emergency placements often times meant that the kids were not in permanent care yet which effected who had to give permission to travel out of state. Although I found that telling them I would be dropping the child off at DCFS offices on my way out of town if they did not figure it out, usually helped clear things through!
Thanks, Theaterforme. Respite/short term care was what I was initially thinking (less of a commitment at the outset). Then I heard from the folks on this thread the other ways of being involved that aren’t full on/full-time commitment. Lots of options now.
So glad it worked out for you and your family! Interesting that the representation was so meaningful for you. I pictured being the lawyer in any foster care matter as deep into the most frustrating, admin-heavy, systematically difficult aspects of the foster care process (vs. the in-person care and support). Maybe there is more to the legal aspect, though. Something worth thinking about!
A lot of the commitment level is going to depend on how the system works where you live. I have lived in two states with different systems. Lawyers in my current state are required to represent the best interest of the child, not what the child wants. Every kid gets a lawyer, a social worker and a CASA and the judge leads the case. The law part here is much more hands off and technical. IN the state where I acted as a lawyer (and foster parent) for kids, the lawyers were there to advocate for what the children wanted, not what was best for them. And it was advocate across the board. My first kid client I met and asked what I could help her with and she said she needed to be able to access her bank account. So it started there. A week later she calls and says she is going to be kicked out of school for bringing a weapon. It was just bullets that another foster kid and put in her backpack that she didn’t even know were there. It was supposed to automatic expulsion. Without me, it would have been. Honestly, my job (as a lawyer) pretty much ended up being protecting her from being damaged by the system and teaching her to be “normal.” I have zero doubt that I played a big part in breaking the cycle for her and her future offspring. In the state where we fostered and my current state, short term and respite fostercare is much less of a commitment than being a CASA. You take kids when you have the time or space and they are there for generally less than a month. CASAs stick with a kid or a family through the entire case (which is rarely less than 2 years). New kids get added to the family almost invariably, you have attend all the meetings, you have write reports and you are required to visit in person with your kids at least once a month and go do something which doesn’t sound like a problem until you have 6 kids in the family in 3 different placements (which is a super common reason to assign a CASA to the case in the first place). My point being, you need to see what it is like in your area. There is a very very high degree of variance, even within the same small state. You can do info sessions with no obligation for both types of organizations to get a feel for what it is like in your area.
Thanks so much for these nuances, Theaterforme! Very helpful. Great that you made a different in the lives of your young clients via CASA. So impactful.
In NY, I know of this agency: https://www.yougottabelieve.org/about-us/mission-philosophy/
I have a friend who has two sons who came into her home when they were in their late teens. They are both approaching thirty and the permanency of a family has transformed their lives. One of them never went through formal adoption because he felt so worked over by the system that he never wanted to go to court again. That was perfectly ok to his mom.
This agency has a good Facebook page that you can “like.”