Catching kids who don’t have a safety net

Written by MELISSA DICKSON JACKSON    |    Photographed by SARA MOORE  

 

Fifteen-year-old Arielle Gardner loves young adult romance novels, her German shepherd Kuno, playing softball, and her church youth group at Foundation Christian Church. She loves her younger siblings, Michael and Hailey, and patiently tolerates their antics to upstage and distract her.

Arielle, who goes by Ari, smiles and turns her attention to them with an earnest affection instead of the blistering scowl one might expect from a teenager. She’s arguably the best big sister in Newnan, and they seem to know it. Her infectious grace and gratitude radiates to those nearby. She smiles, and the world smiles with her.

But Ari’s story isn’t one of privilege and abundance. It isn’t one filled with annual trips to Disneyland, punctual family dinners, and doting parents who sat through ballet lessons and soccer games. Her story weaves through negligence and endangerment, which led to foster care and, with the help of Wellroot Family Services, ended with Amanda and Mike Newton who fought to give Ari a home, a family and a world that reflects her winning smile.

Amanda and Mike had long considered becoming foster parents. They were inspired by witnessing the need for loving foster care, and the trauma that results from its absence, in Mike’s own family where his half sisters became wards of the system.

The Newtons agreed they were called to foster and to love children who had few safe options left. They looked at it as a long-term plan that would begin after their biological children, Hailey and Michael, grew up a bit more in a balanced, nurturing home that prepared them to host a new sibling in need.

Need, however, doesn’t wait for convenient moments. And Ari’s need was a pressing weight on the hearts of Mike and Amanda Newton.

Amanda had known Ari’s family decades before. When the Newtons learned Ari’s mother was unable to provide the nurturing environment a child needs, they knew someone they could help was surfing the foster care system without a safety net or an advocate.

“We felt God-led,” Amanda says as Mike nods. “We knew this was the plan.”

That feeling of divine intervention led the Newtons to pursue foster guardianship through the Division of Family and Children Services, but every phone call seemed to be a road block designed to discourage them and shift accountability.

“They’re overwhelmed,” Amanda laments.

As luck (or more divine intervention) would have it, a friend recommended Wellroot Family Services, formerly United Methodist Children’s Home, a 150-year-old organization committed to creating a world where children are raised in loving, compassionate and nurturing homes. In Wellroot, the Newtons found the advocate they needed to navigate the foster care system and become that loving, compassionate and nurturing home for Ari.

Amanda and Mike agree they couldn’t have done it without Wellroot, which provided the guidance, advice and protection they needed to create a positive outcome.

Ari admits it was “pretty weird” to meet and suddenly be a part of an entirely new family. To keep connections open with Ari’s family, Amanda is committed to supporting her relationship with her biological mother and grandmother.

“Originally we had planned to pursue reunification with her mom,” Amanda explains, “but after about six months we realized that wasn’t going anywhere.” At that point, the Newtons, with the full support of Ari’s mother, decided to file for full guardianship but to keep the lines of communication open with Ari’s mom. It seems like the best possible outcome, one that gives Ari the freedom, safety and support she needs to thrive while allowing her to know and love her mother.

“It’s one of the hardest things Mike and I have ever gone through as a married couple,” Amanda discloses. “The process wasn’t easy. We were working on it every day for a year. I don’t think we would have been able to go through it without Wellroot. They were a saving grace.”

Wellroot, Amanda explains, is “like a barrier between the foster parent and DFCs.” While DFCs is designed to protect and serve the children in foster care, Wellroot also serves the potential foster parents and helps to facilitate successful outcomes by vetting, preparing and supporting potential foster guardians.

Wellroot, for example, provides weekly visits to the foster home, while DFCs provides monthly visits.

Wellroot also provides a dedicated case manager. For the Newtons, that was Brittany Berto, who became a dear friend with whom they often talked as they navigated the cumbersome process. Wellroot also requires foster applicants to find and enlist a support family that pitches in during times of unexpected need or crisis.

Amanda, who serves as a site coordinator for Elevate Coweta at Newnan High School, seems especially grateful for the clarity and foresight provided by Wellroot. It allowed the Newtons to focus on Ari and the creation of an expanded family dynamic.

“It was pretty good adjusting here,” says Ari, while her little sister Hailey blurts out, “I’m the cool one!”

Hailey, 9, and Michael, 5, marvel at the ways Arielle has changed their world since she joined the family in 2020.

“I used to be the one who got to do the most,” says Hailey grinning. “And now she does!”

Amanda explains that Hailey’s bedtime is later than her little brother Michael’s, but both Newton siblings were startled when their new sister had an even later bedtime. “The later bedtime is hard to understand,” says Amanda. “It’s a learning process.”

Both girls play softball and enjoy supporting each other’s efforts. Ari plays third base and Hailey plays first. Young Michael is enjoying his first soccer season and eager to get on the field.

“We try to balance it all as much as possible,” says Amanda. “We try to make sure each of them gets quality and quiet time at home and at least one parent is at every game.”

Ari will join Amanda next year at Newnan High where she will be a freshman lucky enough to have a parent employed on the campus.

As the conversation turns to Ari’s favorite bands (Nirvana, Current Joy and Surf Curse), Hailey seizes the spotlight once more to tease Ari about her love of TikTok. “I’m not the only one with a cell phone addiction,” Ari whispers goodnaturedly.

As Ari gets up from the table to prepare for a friend’s quinceanera, one of the Newton’s four German shepherds, Kuno, follows closely at her heels.

“He follows her everywhere,” says Amanda.

“I’m his emotional support human,” Ari says with a giggle.

Kuno, it seems, would be as lost without his Ari as the rest of the Newton family. NCM

Fostering to provide home

Written by FRANCES KIDD    |    Photographed by SARA MOORE


Home. It's a word often taken for granted, but it’s more than a word. It's so significant that Merriam-Webster Dictionary classifies it as noun, verb, adverb and adjective.

According to the dictionary’s first three definitions, “home” is a “place of residence,” “a social unit formed by family living together,” and “a familiar or usual setting forming a congenial environment.”

Most people will find those definitions familiar. However, not everybody has the luxury of “going home,” especially children in foster care.

Though local agencies that deal with foster children have different programs and areas of work, their common goal is to reunite families and to create loving homes.

Wellroot provides roots

Wellroot Family Services (formerly the United Methodist Children’s Home) is a leader in the effort to transform the lives of children and families in Georgia. Their name makes it clear: children must be “well-rooted” to thrive.

As an agency of the United Methodist Church in North Georgia, Wellroot Family Services programs are designed to effect change for children and families through faith-centered service focused on supporting youth from infancy through early adulthood.

Based in Tucker, Wellroot Family Services has close connections to Coweta County. In addition to having an active presence in Coweta, President and CEO Allison Ashe is a graduate of East Coweta High School. In a previous job, Ashe led strategic initiatives for Covenant House International, the nation’s leading provider of housing and services for youth experiencing homelessness and human trafficking.

“My work at Covenant House developed my passion for family preservation,” Ashe says. “These young people want their mom and dad no matter how much they’ve been through.”

The bipartisan Family First Prevention Services Act of 2018 recognized this in the legislation, which represented significant reform to federal child welfare policy.

Wellroot takes a holistic approach to its work in foster care, a temporary living situation for children whose parents cannot take care of them and whose need for care has come to the attention of a child welfare agency.

“We’re in the business of helping families, whatever it takes,” says Ashe.

In addition to foster care, Wellroot's Healthy Families America promotes child wellbeing and prevents abuse and neglect through in-home, family-focused support. They provide family support systems that treat behavioral and emotional problems in children and teens as well as short-term, family-based therapeutic intervention for at-risk youth and their families.

A challenge that has long complicated foster care occurs when children age out of the system when they turn 18 and may find themselves out in the world on their own. Wellroot has found one way to provide a solution by providing transitional living for youth who are 18 but haven’t yet found a home. They have the option to stay in state care and receive supportive services that will help them make the challenging transition toward independence. The teens live in apartments that Wellroot manages and get help in job training, attending school or getting their GED.

Wellroot also developed the Family Housing program, serving up to six families with one or more children who are at imminent risk of homelessness. Families must be living together prior to acceptance into the program; Wellroot provides housing and financial assistance. The organization supports the families with parenting courses, financial management courses, career coaching and personal development.

“When a family graduates from our program, each one will have at least $1,000 in savings and steady employment,” Ashe says.

Wellroot’s outcomes prove the effectiveness of what they do. For example, 84% of youth in the transitional and independent living program are on track to complete high school or obtain a GED, and 100% of the residents who graduate from the Family Housing program earn a living wage.

“We have a 75% permanency rate, which means we are able to connect children to their forever families that are healthy and stable,” says Ashe. “This is done through family reunification, adoption, and/or kinship homes.”

Angel’s House

The Newnan-Coweta community is fortunate to have a number of organizations providing aid to children and families. They vary from government agencies and school systems to nonprofit organizations working in different areas. All have the same goal.

Newnan’s well-respected Angel’s House provides a specific service.

“We are an emergency facility for teenage girls in crisis,” says board member Kelley Welden. “We stand in the gap between foster care and where the girls come from.”

Angel’s House and the state’s Department of Family & Children service (DFCS) partner to get girls who need immediate help to a secure environment; DFCS identifies girls who are in crisis and works with Angel’s House to get them in a safe place.

Open since June 2004, Angel's House is licensed to accommodate a maximum of 10 children. Some stay temporarily and are later placed with relatives. An average of seven to 10 girls live at Angel’s House on a daily basis. Since it opened, Angel’s House has provided a safe haven for more than 265 children.

Angel’s House contracts with the Georgia Baptist Children’s Home to provide staff and oversight, according to Welden.

“Angel’s House runs like a home, with group leaders serving as houseparents,” she adds. “The residents help prepare meals, spend time in the garden and do their homework. One thing we know is that these girls need structure and they need education.”

The girls attend school in the Coweta County School System, a strong supporter of the program. 

Its Board of Directors is dedicated to making sure Angel’s House is fully funded and the girls have all they need. Their largest annual event, Run for Angels, returned for the nonprofit's 20th anniversary in March after being canceled last year due to the March 2021 tornado. Board members Barbara Chandler, Kate Goodson and Kelley Welden co-chaired the 2022 run.

“We’re very thankful for this community,” Welden says.

Hope Revisited

Jennifer Nolder is president of the board of directors for Hope Revisited, one of the newer foster organizations in Coweta.

A foster parent herself and also president of the Coweta Foster Parent Association, Nolder has done research for several years on how visitations between children and the parents they are separated from are handled.

Sometimes, visits “took place in a fast-food playground or even riding around in a car,” Nolder says.

“As a foster parent, Jennifer Nolder has been extremely supportive of birth parents, even when they aren't always initially receptive,” says Gretchen Cleveland, Coweta County director of the Georgia Division of Family & Children Services. “That included more than two years of helping a birth parent recover from substance abuse. And after seeing the need for a better place for children to have supervised visits with their parents, she worked to create Hope Revisited.”

Since Hope Revisited opened in August 2002, its all-volunteer group has worked to advance their mission to create a safe and stable environment where families disconnected due to life circumstances learn to achieve sustainable unification.

Coweta CASA

Cleveland says DFCS also works closely with Coweta Court Appointed Special Advocates for Children (CASA). Coweta CASA is part of a national network of nearly 1,000 community based programs that recruit, train and support volunteers to advocate for the best interests of abused and neglected children in courts and communities.

Coweta CASA volunteers are appointed by the Juvenile Court to advocate for children in foster care. Each CASA volunteer follows one court case at a time – involving a child or group of siblings – to provide caring attention and a voice in court. In an often hectic and overworked system, they are there for the children. NCM