Speaking Up For Kids

Rochelle Vigurs, Franklin/Hampshire CASA, Amherst, MA

Seemed like I had all my ducks in a row—comfortable life, good health, good friends, first grandchild on the way. Then I read the Department of Social Services‚ 2006 stats, and my complacent little world rocked. Massachusetts holds the dubious honor of recording the third highest rate of child abuse in the country. (Yes, the country.) DSS reports that by the end of 2006, they had 42,000 children on their watch. 10,000 of those kids—22% of them in Western Mass—live in foster care or residential facilities, sometimes for years. In fact, DSS’s Greenfield office is one of two in the state with the highest numbers of children in placement.

Some children are being betrayed this very moment by the adults in their lives: abused, neglected, abandoned. For these kids, the world has become a terrifying place, and their small voices lost in it.

I found Friends of Children in Northampton, a non-profit child advocacy group They showed me how I could be a voice for a child who needs to be heard.

For me, it was a call to action. I’d been thinking for years about finding some meaningful volunteer work. Through the website of the United Way, I found Friends of Children in Northampton, a non-profit child advocacy group. They showed me how I could be a voice for a child who needs to be heard. I know I can’t stop what might be happening right now to some child unknown to me. I can’t fix the past, or make it all better. But with training and ongoing support, I can investigate, report, and make recommendations. I can be that child’s voice in the present and into his future. I can stand up for him in Juvenile Court, and the Judge will listen to the information I provide. Among all the competing adult interests, my voice, speaking on behalf of the child, will be heard.

By the time I met J, he hadn’t seen the inside of a schoolroom for six months. His progress was measured by the number of ’holds’ staff had wrestled him into that week. In and out of foster care, acute residential treatment centers, even the children’s ward of a psychiatric hospital, abandoned and neglected by those he cared about most, this ten-year-old was understandably angry and confused.

Today, and for the time being, J lives in a home for troubled youth, a place that cares about kids and what they can become. As his CASA, I am part of the team working on his behalf to achieve stability and permanency. We mustn’t waste time: the clock of his childhood is ticking away. On my last visit with him he smiled more times than I could count. I watched him help a younger child with a puzzle. I heard how he’s working at grade level, that he’s smart and cooperative, that he likes to use the computer, that he likes to watch basketball on TV, that he’s made a new best friend. Not too long ago I watched him skate around an outdoor rink, slamming a puck against the boards, his cheeks flushed in the cold. Kid stuff, the kind of thing every kid should be able to take for granted.

What’s next for J is unknown. One thing is certain, though: as long as he remains in the care and protection of DSS, as his CASA I will be in the wings.

Because the way I see it, all you can do to make a difference is to take one step forward, one step at a time. Then you toss it out there — the love, the commitment, the belief.

Because the way I see it, all you can do to make a difference is to take one step forward, one step at a time. Then you toss it out there—the love, the commitment, the belief.

Last week, I went to see J play baseball. I don’t know much about baseball. But I do know something about J. I know what he’s been through, that he’s a survivor, that he is his own worst critic, that he doesn’t trust easily. I watched him step up to the mound. He stood there a moment, feet together, thoughtfully turning the ball inside his left fist, his right arm with its big glove hanging loose. The hitter, almost as skinny as the bat he had in motion, leaned over the plate. For a long minute, J studied him, yet I could see that his eyes were everywhere, alert to what might come next, or not. He shifted his weight and took a step back. He wound up. Took a step forward. Threw.