Fostering Change

A reminder that through the end of November  (National Adoption Awareness Month), when you visit www.BarelyCanadian.com our friend Kelly and her team will donate a Comfort XL Duffle bag for every one of their amazingly plush items purchased. Today, we go back almost exactly 3 years to revisit a special episode about a remarkable woman, Pam Willis and family.  We know you’ll enjoy!Pam and her husband have been married 36 years, raised 5 biological children (the youngest is 20). 11 years ago they became foster parents and began caring for children in their home. Pam led down a road of foster care and as a surprise to their life plan, 5 years ago they adopted a set of seven siblings from the foster care system.  These kids now have a second chance at parenting, and they have a second chance at a family after their first parents passed away in a car accident.It’s an amazing story we wanted to reshare with you. Story Key Notes:🖐️Adopting 7 Sets of Children Siblings 🖐️History of the 7 Children🖐️Adjusting into a New Home🖐️5 Biological Children's Reaction to Adopt New Siblings🖐️Process to Adopt 7 Set of Children SiblingsLearn more at https://www.comfortcases.org/If you have any questions, comments or guest suggestions, please reach out to us at info@comfortcases.org.HAPPY THANKSGIVING !!!

It is National Adoption Awareness Month, and Comfort Cases is honoring the occasion with special promotions. Our “Coats for Comfort” Coat Drive, co-sponsored by CNN’s Laura Coates, is in full swing. There are donation boxes throughout the DC Metro area (including Maryland & Virginia), and for those of you outside the district, you can purchase coats and have them delivered directly to Comfort Cases by visiting https://comfortcases.org/lauracoates/We are thrilled to announce our renewed partnership with Barely Canadian, running through November 30th! Known for their insanely soft sweaters and premium apparel, they have redefined cozy. With every purchase from their beautiful garment collection, Barely Canadian will generously donate a Comfort XL (valued at $148) to a child entering foster care. Explore their collection here: https://barelycanadian.com/In today’s powerful episode of Fostering Change, we welcome Gretchen Sisson, author of RELINQUISHED: The Politics of Adoption and the Privilege of American Motherhood. As a researcher at UC San Francisco’s Advancing New Standards in Reproductive Health, Gretchen has conducted hundreds of interviews with women who have relinquished infants for adoption, especially since Roe v. Wade. Her eye-opening research has been featured on NPR, New York Magazine, VOX, and more.In this riveting conversation with host Rob Scheer, they dive into the complex and often heartbreaking reasons behind adoption decisions, shedding light on the financial and societal pressures that force mothers to make impossible choices. This timely discussion touches on the profound challenges families face and why it should matter to us all. This is an important discussion for our community, and we were honored to have Gretchen on Fostering Change to continue it.For more information about RELINQUISHED or to follow Gretchen on social media, please visit:Website: https://www.gretchensisson.com/Twitter/X: @gesisson Threads: gretchen.sissonInstagram: @gretchen.sisson LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/gretchensisson/Substack: https://gretchen.substack.com/#nationaladoptionawarenessmonth #adoptionawareness #fostercare

“When good people get together, great things happen.” - Jamie TrumanOn today’s episode of Fostering Change, we welcome our good friend Jamie Truman. She and her husband Jerry co-founded Truman Charities, an organization that truly exemplifies what our host, Rob Scheer, has expressed over the years: it focuses on helping other local and national charities, hosts events multiple times a year, and covers all costs so that 100% of raised funds go directly to the charity.Over the past fifteen years, Truman Charities has raised a little over $2 million for several different charities (INCLUDING COMFORT CASES). Yes, Jamie and Jerry epitomize being “Good Humans.”Jamie is also the author of “Vanishing Fathers: The Ripple Effect on Tomorrow's Generation," which hit #1 on Amazon's Best New Releases. Of course, 100% of the proceeds from Vanishing Fathers go towards charities that help at-risk youth.These two themes, giving back to society and the important roles fathers play in that same society, are discussed in a lively interview. We know you will not only enjoy them but also be inspired.Jamie Truman hosts The Truman Charities Podcast, which you can find wherever you listen to podcasts.Find out more about Jamie and Truman Charities below:Order her book, “Vanishing Fathers”: https://www.amazon.com/Vanishing-Fathers-Ripple-Tomorrows-Generation/dp/B0CW3Q1QY8.Visit the Website: trumancharities.comFacebook: trumancharitesInstagram: jamie_trumancharitiesLinkedIn: jamietrumanEmail: info@trumancharities.comThank you for listening! Of course, if you have any questions or comments about today’s episode or a suggestion for a guest for Fostering Change, please reach out to us at info@comfortcases.org.

"If you have nobody, you have yourself." Lillian ColonWhen Lillian Colon shared that phrase above with Rob Scheer when he interviewed her recently, there was a pause in the conversation as those words hit home. Reflect on them for a moment.On today’s episode of Fostering Change, Rob interviews Lillian Colon, who spent more than a decade in a strict New York City orphanage because her father “thought it would be best” to separate from the mother she adored. With restrictions all around her, she strove to be someone better than anyone ever believed she could. Lilly never knew the care and loving attention of a stable family, but she didn’t let obstacles and family tragedies stand in the way of her dreams.As a child, after the nuns who ran the orphanage took her to Radio City Music Hall to see the famed “Rockettes, “Lilly was driven to become a dancer. A graduate of New York’s prestigious High School of Performing Arts (if you’ve ever seen the movie Fame,” you’ll understand), Lillian became the first Latina Rockette. Lillian achieved so much more in her career, having performed with some of the great names in Hollywood and on Broadway, including the legendary Chita Rivera. Most recently, she was the oldest dancer in the Hollywood adaptation of Lin Manuel Miranda’s “In the Heights!” We celebrate this achievement on the last day of Hispanic Heritage Month.Lillian shares all this in her memoir Lilly: The First Latina Rockette. This is a truly lovely conversation with a wonderful, good human. We know you will enjoy her growing-up stories and her performance success.To find out more about what Lillian is up to, please visit her website: https://www.lilliancolon.com/ You can purchase her book here: https://www.lilliancolon.com/product/lilly-book/Thank you for listening! Of course, if you have any questions or comments about today’s episode or a suggestion for a guest for Fostering Change, please reach out to us at info@comfortcases.org.

It’s October! Comfort Cases held our annual fundraiser event this past weekend, a “Farm-to-Table Feast.” It was a memorable event, with inspirational speakers, including our keynote speaker, Cowboy Jax, our emcee, the fabulous Jen Lilley, and our founder and host of Fostering Change, Rob Scheer. There’s still time to donate or contribute your most valuable asset - your TIME - to Comfort Cases. Please visit www.comfortcases.org to find out more!We recorded our show today several weeks ago but intentionally posted it today, as we are featuring not one, not two, but THREE Good Humans: Rob’s special co-host Jill Ross, who is also the President of Comfort Cases’ Board of Directors, and Parker Lopez and Ashley Baker, who were both recent recipients of academic scholarships presented by Comfort Cases at previous fundraiser events.Parker and Ashley share how these scholarships have profoundly impacted them and how they could advance their academic pursuits.Beyond academics, they also are giving back to the community:Parker is involved with “First Star” Academies (https://eoss.asu.edu/access/first-star-academy) a long-term college-prep program for high school students in foster care, while Ashley works with “It’s On Us” (www.itsonus.org) a non-profit campaign in the United States aimed at raising awareness about sexual assault and promoting a culture of consent.Jill also shares more about Comfort Cases’ Pathway Program, which is designed to provide additional resources to our scholarship recipients. You can learn more about Pathways by visiting https://scheerfocus.com/pathways-program/We hope you feel inspired and hopeful after listening to these fantastic young people. It is people like them who will make all of our futures brighter.If you have any questions or comments about our interview with Jill, Parker, and Ashley or have a guest suggestion, please feel free to email us at info@comfortcases.org.

Welcome back to Season 6 of Fostering Change! We hope you enjoyed our first episode of the season with Andrew Bridge. This is a reminder that if you order his book before its publication date, a portion of the sale will go to CASA chapters nationwide. Please visit AndrewBridgeAuthor.com and select the CASA chapter of your choice.In today’s episode, we have two exceptional guests - one is making her second appearance on our show. Donna Biase co-founded BEST FOOT FORWARD Foundation, a Florida-based organization whose mission is to empower foster care and at-risk youth to become self-sufficient adults and positive contributing members of society through academic achievement. Having survived the deadly and horrific earthquake that ravaged his home country of Haiti, Elie Merisier was in the foster care system in High School when Best Foot Forward reached out to him to provide assistance with his academic studies. We’ll let you listen to the show for more details, but you should know that despite attending five different high schools, Elie graduated from Florida Atlantic University with a degree in accounting. Today, he is a licensed real estate agent.We hope you enjoy today’s episode of Fostering Change as much as we think you will. Of course, if you have any questions or comments about our interview with Elie and Donna or have a guest suggestion, please email us at info@comfortcases.org.More about Donna and Elie:To learn more about Elie, please follow him on social media:Facebookhttps://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=100092082848694Instagramhttps://www.instagram.com/elie_merisier/LinkedInhttps://www.linkedin.com/feed/eliemerisier/To learn more about Best Foot Forward:Facebookfacebook.com/bestfootkidsInstagraminstagram.com/bestfootkidsTwitter/Xtwitter.com/bestfootkids

Welcome to Season 6 of Fostering Change! Following 220 amazing episodes, we are so excited for what’s to come this season.  We have special and moving guests, and throughout the season we are inviting some of Comfort Cases’ friends to co-host episodes with Rob Scheer.  That includes today’s episode, as we are so lucky to have Rita Soronen, CEO of the Dave Thomas Center for Adoption join Rob to interview our first guest of the season, Andrew Bridge, author of The Child Catcher: A Fight for Justice & Truth. If you have a suggestion for a guest, or questions or comments about today’s episode, please reach out to us at info@comfortcases.org.About today’s first episode of our new season:  Rob and Rita have a riveting conversation with Andrew Bridge - about his time in foster care, and the battles he has fought for youth in foster care. His new book, The Child Catcher, is the true story of the fight to rescue the children confined to a violent and secretive institution in the rural South.Proceeds from the book will go to CASA National, State, and local county chapters. Buyers should go to AndrewBridgeAuthor.com and select the CASA chapter of their choice, and 50% of pre-sale royalties will go there.More About Andrew: Andrew spent 11 years in Los Angeles County foster care. After aging out, unlike so many in foster care he made it to college: Wesleyan University, and then graduated from Harvard Law School and was awarded a Fulbright Fellowship. He began his legal career representing children against the State of Alabama, where his work resulted in the closure of one of the country’s most notorious psychiatric institutions, the Eufaula Adolescent Center. Returning to Los Angeles, he became CEO of The Alliance for Children’s Rights, representing children in the foster care system where he grew up. Andrew is the co-founder of National Adoption Day and New Village Girls Academy for pregnant and parenting teens. As Chair of Los Angeles County’s Blue Ribbon Task Force, he called for an end to the disproportionate removal of Black babies from their mothers. His memoir Hope’s Boy was a New York Times bestseller and Washington Post Best Book of the Year. Most recently, he was a member of the executive management team for Illinois DCFS, and with Arizona as his home, he now serves on the Arizona Foster Care Review Board. His second book about that fight against Alabama, The Child Catcher, will be released in September. To find out more about Andrew, please follow him on social media:Facebookhttps://www.facebook.com/andrew.bridge.9041/InstagramandrewbridgejdTwitter/X@AndrewBridgeJDThreadsAndrewBridgejd

You’ve made it!  It’s the end of August and our final “Best of Season 5” episode of the season, and we’ve saved a very special episode just for you.Just a note that Season 6 will debut next week, Tuesday, September 3.  We have some amazing guests lined up, and are doing something new this season: on several episodes, we are bringing in special guests to Co-Host interviews with Rob Scheer.  You’ll recognize some of the names as previous guests, and there will also be some new names for you - who we know you will love as much as we do.Now, for our final “Best of” we needed to do something special. When we booked Emily Cole on Fostering Change last December for our 200th episode, we knew that we would hear all about the amazing Savannah Bananas baseball team (maybe you’ve been lucky enough to see them in person this season, or at least on ESPN?) as well as their philanthropic effort Bananas Foster, dedicated to Bringing Families Together by focusing on celebrating those who are doing amazing things in the foster care world while educating and inspiring others to get involved. Because of all that Emily, her husband Jesse, and the team do for our foster youth, Comfort Cases will award them our special Barbara Harrison Award at our Farm-to-Feast Annual Fundraising event on September 28. This award is given annually to someone who truly is changing the lives of those in the foster care system.If you would like to celebrate Emily, Jess and many other “Good Humans”, we would love for you to join us on September 28. Tickets are available at https://comfortcases.org/feast/. If you have an item you would like to donate for our live auction, you can also find information on the site.  Our annual fundraiser is held on a beautiful farm in the Maryland countryside.  There will be entertainment by our friends, the Como Brothers, fabulous food and wine, and other surprises.Emily shares her story with Rob on today’s podcast. We hope you will find it inspiring and motivated to become involved in your community, be it foster care or some other form of charitable act.To learn more about Bananas Foster, please visit: https://bananasfoster.org/ and visit https://thesavannahbananas.com/ to learn more about the Savannah Bananas Baseball team!You can follow Emily and the Bananas on Social Media:Instagram: @EmCole3 @thesavbananas @bananasfosterincTikTok: @SavBananasFacebook: https://www.facebook.com/TheSavBananasTo listen to previous episodes of Fostering Change, please visit: www.comfortcases.org/podcast or your favorite podcast outlets.If you have any comments, questions, or guest suggestions, we’d love to hear from you!  Please write us at info@comfortcases.org.Thank you for listening and we’ll see you next Tuesday for the start of Season 6 of Fostering Change!!!