A GIFT THAT WILL LAST

A CASA volunteer takes time to listen to a child and to advocate for them in the juvenile court system.

In this holiday season and throughout the year, right here in Southeast Missouri, there are abused and neglected children who live in the shadows of our lives. She may be the little girl in your son's kindergarten class, who had to move homes and change schools three or four times in the last year. He may be the lonely child at the park who doesn't join the game. They are the forgotten children who have no one to speak for them.

The foster care and child welfare system is full of compassionate social workers, foster families, lawyers, and judges. According to recent statistics each year more than 748,000 children are placed in foster care nationally, and over 250 children were in care in Cape Girardeau, Bollinger and Perry counties last year. This intense need can strain the system to the point where these compassionate people are simply unable to protect the rights of each child. So the little girl who has already suffered in an abusive home, enters the foster care system which places her in three or four different homes in just a few months. Or the two siblings who lost their mother to incarceration are split up and living on different sides of the same county. A child cannot defend his or her own rights, but a CASA volunteer can!

CASA, Court Appointed Special Advocates, is a national nonprofit organization which trains and supports volunteers--people like you and me--to speak and act as advocates for the best interests of abused and neglected children. They are trained to work within the child welfare and family court systems and are appointed by judges to individual cases. With the help of a CASA volunteer, a child is half as likely to languish in the foster care system, and that much more likely to find a safe and permanent home. I have seen first-hand the transformative impact a CASA volunteer can have on a child. But today only 35% of the children in need have access to a CASA volunteer. More than 500,000 children don't have that advocate. CASA is dedicated to ensuring that every child in the foster care and child welfare system has a qualified CASA volunteer looking out for their best interests. To do this, we will need to more than double the 75,000 current CASA volunteers in 950 local chapters nationwide. Volunteers of every color and background are needed.

Every child has a right to thrive; to be treated with dignity, and to live in a safe, loving home.

Every child deserves a fighting chance. Given a chance, these former foster kids will be our future doctors, teachers and leaders. Surviving a period of vulnerability and fear, the child will have a better sense of his potential and his rights. She will believe in herself. Fostering this potential in these vulnerable children is our opportunity and our challenge. I invite the people of Southeast Missouri to stand with me and support these children who are our future.

This holiday season give a gift that will last a lifetime! Stand up for a child! Call the CASA office (573-335-1726) or email lnash@capecasa.com or jobermann@capecasa.com and see how you can help. Classes begin in January.

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