This little girl arrived in Texas and was looking forward to the more wide-open planes than what she had been accustomed to while living up North since birth. 35 days after arriving in our great state, the school called in a report on a younger brother who was acting out. 35 days after arriving in Texas, she learned what foster care entailed.

At Hill Country Youth Ranch, she was placed in the same facility with her siblings but since they are males, she was not allowed to speak to them!

After being in orphanage foster care, getting several black eyes, moved from school to school, placement to placement, the reading disabilities she had been diagnosed with in early elementary school had been removed from her Special Education Requirements; she was failing at school and angry at the world.

At one point, it became so bad that she wrote a letter to Judge Sakai, in San Antonio TX, begging him to move her, "because the other girls feel on each other and I have to look for bugs in my food."

Within a matter of weeks she was moved from Campbell Griffin to Everyday Life facility.

No one could tell her what she had done wrong, why she had to be taken from the only people in Texas she knew, placed in a psychiatric hospital, and medicated.

If only CPS in San Antonio had read the first letter they received, they would have realized it was a Release of Information, allowing both states to speak about the possible needs of her and her siblings, and the counselor at the school's call would not have caused this to be a Level I Intake; due to two "referrals" within 35 days.

She entered foster care with all her new clothes and shoes because school had only recently begun.

During the 11 months she spent in foster care she was:

1. Taken from her home,
2. Placed in a psyche hospital,
3. Moved to Hill Country Youth Ranch, moved from HCYR within days of reporting to her therapist that she was being abused by another child,
4. Moved to Campbell Griffin then ordered to be
5. Moved Everyday Life,
6. before going home.

She has had to move five times in less than one year, each time trying to learn the rules, deal with bullies in new schools, deal with out of control workers with a severe lack of training, being placed with sexual perverts more than four years older than she, and finally to a place with some sense and sensibility, until she could go home. During all these moves, she lost all her belongings and was sent home with the clothes on her back. School started in two weeks.

We should have taken a before and after picture because you would not recognize the poised, proud stance you see in these pictures, taken after Hope4KidZ purchased $250.00 in clothes and shoes for her to begin the new school year.

How do we expect a child to have a successful outcome, given these conditions?