Care Packages for Residents of the Columbus Scholar House for Foster Youth

On Wednesday, August 20, 2025,  ACTION Ohio delivered care packages with laminated resource lists, credit union cups, leftover snacks from the Summit and bags for residents of the Columbus Scholar House for Former Foster Youth.

2025 Leadership and Life Skills Summit

On Tuesday, June 17, 2024, the OHIO YAB and ACTION Ohio facilitated a Leadership and Life Skills Summit for Current and Former Foster Youth, to inform and empower Ohio teens and young adults with a foster care history (ages 14-24).  This event was made possible thanks to the support of the Ohio Children’s Alliance, the Department of Children and Youth, the Dave Thomas Foundation and The Ohana Project.

Youth and young adults from the following counties participated: Allen, Ashland, Athens, Clermont, Cuyahoga, Franklin, Geauga, Hamilton, Lake, Lorain, Lucas, Montgomery, Muskingum, Portage, Richland and Stark. 

Link to more photos.

The Summit included a Wellness Area called “Exhale,” designed by Alana, Renee and Raven of the OHIO YAB, to provide a safe space for young people to relax, paint rocks, journal, and learn some yoga and breathing techniques. 

As designed by youth, the Wellness Area included fairy lights, an essential oil diffuser, LED Votive Candles, and a Tabletop Water Fountain. Activities included decorating journals, painting rocks and bags to write how youth leaders plan to "exhale" in 2025. 

Annie Curtis of Columbus Public Health and Holly Jones, the creator and maintainer of the Wellness Project brought yoga mats, blocks, cushions, speakers to play music, coping skill packets, brochures about healing from trauma, and mindfulness activities for participating youth and young adults. Many thanks to Caidyn, Addison, Alexys and Lori for set-up and support of "Exhale."

The 2025 Summit incorporated the voices and input of current and/or former foster youth. Lisa Dickson served as event organizer, with input from OHIO YAB members. Jamole Callahan and Alexys Rose emceed the event. Caidyn, Addison, Tori and Ruth-Ann assisted with event facilitation. 

Director Kara Wente's Opening Remarks reflected DCY's commitment to listen to the insights of young people in and from foster care. Youth participants received shirts as a workshop supply, on which they could write down what they want decision-makers to know. The quote on the back of the shirts came from OHIO YAB Youth Ambassador Yonnae Ase: "Behind every policy maker is a person."

Four OHIO YAB Youth Leadership workshops were facilitated by Alivia Johnson and Talia Holmes. Jaye Turner facilitated two adult workshops on Conscious Connections and two youth workshops on Healthy Relationships. Deanna Jones led two workshops on Exit Plans and one on Building Capacity to Support Teen Parents. Adam Hassan assisted Amanda Davis with the Ohio ETV workshop, and Gabriella Craft helped present the Post Secondary Resources workshop.

This year, we wanted to incentivize youth workshop attendance. This is one day that is designed just for them. Young people received stamps for attending workshops, and were required to attain a certain number of stamps in order to be eligible for the raffle.  

We are deeply grateful to The Ohana Project for their support of the Summit by providing AMAZING raffle prizes!  These included an Electric Scooter 28-mile range, a 50" 4K Roku Smart TV, an HP Chromebook Touch in Lavender, an HP Chromebook in Silver, an Apple Watch, a Samsung Watch, Beats Headphones, a Beats Pill speaker and more!  

Thanks to support from Congregation Beth Tikvah, we had 25 Kitchen Essentials baskets for the raffle, to support transition-age youth. Many thanks to Kristin Camac and Kim Eckhart for helping to store and transport these beautiful baskets, which were initially donated during a Mitzvah Day in April.
 

Through the Suits for Success Initiative, young people in and from foster care were able to try on and keep professional clothing items. We deeply appreciate help behind the scenes with Suits for Success transportation by the Department of Children and Youth and the Ohio Children's Alliance. Special thanks goes to Velda Hofacker for storing these clothing items and to foster care alumni Dauntea Sledge for driving the U-Haul van both days. 

Finally, we wanted to mention the resource tables that were available during the event. These included: Bridges, DCY, ESSA, ETV, FosterHub, Fostering Achievement Network, The Ohana Project, Ohio Medicaid, Ohio Reach, Trades Institute, Youth Navigator Network, and Youth Ombudsman.

Many of the Resource Tables had snacks with encouraging messages for participating youth. 

Ohio Senate Finance Committee ~ Legislative Testimony 5/30/2025

On May 30, 2025, foster care alumna Gabriella Craft spoke before the Ohio Senate Finance Committee, and shared why Foster to College Scholarships are vitally important. 

Ohio Senate Finance Committee ~ Legislative Testimony 5/29/2025

On Thursday, May 29, 2025, foster care alumni Adam Hassan got up early in the morning to begin his day at the Statehouse. He waited over six and a half hours to provide his testimony - which enlisted positive feedback from Vice Chair Chavez and Senators Hearcel Craig and George Lang. 

 

Ohio Senate Finance Committee ~ Legislative Testimony 5/27/2025

On Tuesday, May 26, 2025, Caidyn Bearfield, Jaleshia Brown and Yonnae Ase provided legislative testimony before the Ohio Senate Finance Committee. 

Here are links to videos of each of their testimonials:

• Caidyn
• Jaleshia
• Yonnae

Gongwer Article: Foster child scholarship pitched for budget inclusion

 Foster child scholarship pitched for budget inclusion

Gongwer News Service-Ohio, Friday, May 16, 2025

Advocates are pushing for placement of a long-discussed plan to provide financial aid to former foster children in the Fiscal Year 2026-2027 state operating budget.

Adam Hassan, a former foster child and Columbus State Community College student, urged the Senate Higher Education Committee on Thursday to include legislation (SB 13 ) establishing the Foster-to College Scholarship program in the spending outline (HB 96 ).

Hassan said he has seen students with similar backgrounds pause their education for long stretches of time or abandon it shortly before attaining a degree based on a lack of financial resources and family support.

"As someone who is a foster care alumni and is engaged with the foster care community, I am a firsthand witness to the variety of struggles that we face when seeking to better ourselves and our futures through higher academia," he said. "Financial security is a crucial component for foster care alumni."

The legislation backed for budget inclusion, which is being sponsored by Sen. Michele Reynolds (R-Canal Winchester) for the second consecutive session, includes a $7.5 million annual appropriation for the scholarship program.

Awards from the financial aid program would be available to Ohio residents who have been accepted at an institution of higher education and who were placed in foster or noncertified kinship care on or after their 13th birthday.

Reynolds' bill (SB 182 of 2023) received three hearings last session, while a House companion measure (HB 164 of 2023) cleared that body before stalling in the upper chamber. Rep. Dontavius Jarrells (D-Columbus) is again leading companion legislation (HB 25 ) in the House this session.

Kim Eckhart said Connecticut has been offering scholarships for foster youth since 1968 and paid for her mother to attend Marietta College. She said the last dollar financial aid program – meaning one intended to cover the gap between the full cost of higher education and existing federal and state scholarships – would not be exorbitantly expensive for the state.

"This is not as costly as it sounds because there is already a patchwork of aid available to students from federal, state and private sources," she said. "Tuition waivers knit together this patchwork so that students do not have to navigate complex financial aid processes on their own."

Asked by Sen. Bill Reineke (R-Tiffin) whether the scholarship could be used for housing, Eckhart said it could be used for room and board and other expenses beyond tuition.

Eckhart said Reynolds has been helping advocates of the scholarship draft budget language when asked by Sen. Kyle Koehler (R-Springfield) if they have a proposed amendment to offer.

Sen. Catherine Ingram (D-Cincinnati) questioned whether creating a new scholarship program for foster youth when some policymakers have been focused on eliminating financial aid for "separate groups of people."

Eckhart said she has saved over the years to provide for her child's college education. "I would say that the state can also do that as well," she said, noting foster children are considered "wards of the state."

Ingram said the state needs to do a better job ensuring foster youth are aware of the existing resources available to them in the years approaching emancipation. "It's the system that needs to be fixed, too," she said.

Eckhart said advocates of the scholarship heard similar concerns in the House, adding that SB16 would require the Department of Higher Education to facilitate the employment of four full-time foster care student navigators to help direct individuals to available forms of aid.

*Gabriella Craft, who was not quoted in the article, is a foster care alumna who has helped former foster youth navigate higher education at Columbus State Community College and The Ohio State University.

Statehouse Day for Foster Youth

On Thursday, May 15, 2025, Ohio foster care youth and alumni participated in a Statehouse Day. This event was organized by Lisa Dickson of ACTION Ohio. It was based on the advocacy priorities of the OHIO YAB, including the Foster to College Act, Sibling Connections Matter and safeguarding youth who run away to escape abuse. 

The Franklin County group included Adam, Addison, Alexys, Alivia, Caidyn, Gabby and Jaye:

The Hamilton County group included Alana, Antonio, Jaleshia, Saphire, Yalonda and Yonnae.

The Montgomery County group included Abbey, Aryunna, Dalen, Jaylin, Jordan and Renee.

The Combined County group included Ashley, Lisa, Mattie, Renee, Savannah and Zoey. 

Link to more photos. 

We are thankful for our Statehouse Day helpers!