Opportunity, One Kid at a Time

Clara Sturak
Associate editor

   Unlike many non-profits, the name is not overly cheerful or charming. It doesn’t have to be. The Center for Educational Opportunities (CEO) is what is says it is, an organization dedicated to providing educational opportunities for Los Angeles area foster children.
   “The big missing piece for [foster children] is education. With all the chaos in their lives, they are often bumped from school to school, and their education is the thing that most suffers,” explains the Center’s director, Deanne Shartin, adding that recent statistics show that 75 percent of foster children perform below grade level, only 50 percent graduate from high school, and fewer than 1 percent complete college.
   Shartin, formally the Executive Director of United Friends of the Children, a volunteer non-profit organization dedicated to assisting Los Angeles County foster kids, came up with the idea for CEO after being approached by a gentleman who wanted to make a large donation to help an individual child. Shartin realized that the most profound contribution to a child’s life this donor could make would be to fund a private school education. “I thought, if foster kids could have a chance on a day-in, day-out basis to be a part of a smart, caring environment, it could change their lives.”
   Shartin created CEO, and is still its only employee. Through a pilot program with the New Visions Foundation (run by Crossroads school founder and Mirror columnist Paul Cummins), Shartin was able to send five young people to private schools last year –- the program’s first. She estimates that, with the help of foundation grants and private donations, at least fifteen kids will attend LA area schools this fall.
   The program is young, and the process for choosing which foster children will be accepted into it is still fairly informal. “I have a lot of friends, people in the foster care community whom I’ve worked with, who refer children to me,” Shartin says. Using the basic requirements that the child be interested in the program, have a supportive foster family, be between the ages of 10 and 17, and have transportation to the school, Court-appointed children’s attorneys, social workers, children’s commissioners, and principals and teachers at public schools refer potential program participants to Shartin, who then matches them up with schools that have openings.
   One of those friends, Lisa Mandel, is the Law Firm Director of Dependency Court Legal Services. She manages 30 attorneys, all of whom are appointed to foster children, and remain their attorneys as long as they are in the system. “These kids, through no fault of their own, have had to move around a lot,” Mandel says, “They just don’t have the opportunities that other kids may have in terms of private school.” Mandel can’t say enough about CEO, which she believes offers her clients the chance to “get to experience a normal life, with none of the baggage [that usually comes with being a foster child.]”
   Mandel only wishes the program was larger. “There are so many kids whom we could refer, it’s heartbreaking that there are so few spots.” So, how do they choose? Mandel and her staff refer young people who “love school, have support, and are motivated” to succeed. “These are excellent, wonderful kids,” she adds, with an almost motherly pride, a pride that Shartin clearly shares.
   “99 percent of the credit [for the success of the program] goes to the kids,” Shartin says, “These kids want to succeed.” But she emphasizes that her program does not choose only “A” students. “These are not just strong students. But they have the capacity and interest in achieving. [The referrers] saw in them that given a chance, they could really go far.” Many students began CEO performing below grade level, explains Shartin, and are now, with the individualized attention a private school can give, are succeeding and even excelling. (If a student has a problem with a particular subject, CEO will pay the cost of tutoring as well.)
   This is not a stereotypical “afterschool special” situation in which a poor foster kid arrives at a demanding college prep school, only to suffer countless humiliations because he doesn’t belong. No, Shartin won’t let that happen. Before offering financial support for everything from uniforms to musical instruments to just the right backpack, Shartin works hard to place the students in schools that will fit well with their skills, interests and personalities.
   Indeed, the participating schools couldn’t be more different from each other. CEO’s connection with New Visions means that both New Roads and Crossroads Schools in Santa Monica support CEO kids. But so do the all-girl schools Archer in Brentwood and Marlborough in Los Angeles. The tiny Newbridge in Santa Monica is preparing to accept a child into its middle school this fall.
According to Shartin, schools want to participate in the program – In fact, she expects to enroll young people in several newly participating schools this fall.
   They understand the value of offering an education to a child who would otherwise not have access to it, she says, as well as the value of the “diversity of experience” that the child will bring to the school.
   Diversity of experience notwithstanding, participants in CEO are under no obligation to share their status with anyone in the school. They go through the same admissions process as everyone else, and have the same expectations thrust upon them. In many cases, even the school’s faculty does not know that the student is in foster care.
   Vivian, a fifteen year-old sophomore in a westside school (whose name and school have been changed for privacy’s sake) likes it that way. She chooses not to share her status, saying, “You can try to explain things and some people will take it to a whole other level. I don’t want people being in my business.” But Vivian does want to share her feelings about CEO. She didn’t want to go at first, she explains, didn’t want to leave her fiends and start all over at another school. But Vivian and her grandparents (who are also her foster parents) discussed it, and she decided to make the leap. “I thought about my future, and I went along with it.” She hasn’t looked back since.
   Vivian excels in sports, and, thanks to CEO, had the opportunity to begin practicing with her teammates during the summer before school started. By the time the school year began, she already knew the campus and had a handful of friends. It is this kind of support that helps program participants to fit in to their new environments, says Shartin. Not content to just provide financial support, Shartin talks to CEO students “at least once a week.” Just to check in. See how they’re doing. If there’s anything they want to talk about, any thing they may need. “Deanne’s a nice lady,” says Vivian, “We have a great relationship. She always there to give encouraging words.” Those words, as much as anything, help the students to succeed.
   And Vivian has done just that. She is a star athlete, and a bright student with plans to attend college. She says that she “has a lot of choices” for her future now, but also, that she’s “always had a chance. I know I just have to work for what I want.” Her choices for college? “Either Spellman, Xavier, or Tennessee,” she says with anticipation, “that last one’s for sports.”