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| Parenting Older Adolescents - September 26, 2011 |
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In this free webcast, Dr. Gerald Mallon, Executive Director of the National Resource Center for Permanency and Family Connections, spoke with Mary Keane, a foster and adoptive parent in New York State, as well as Aileen, one of Mary’s daughters. Mary shared her experiences as a lesbian resource parent, focusing on how she has engaged older adolescents, including how she has effectively supported youth in pursuing their educational goals. Mary also discussed how she has met the needs of LGBT youth in her care. Aileen shared her experiences in care, focusing on the type of support that has been important to her and helped her to form a positive relationship with her foster mother and siblings. |
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Speakers
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Gerald P. Mallon, DSW
Professor & Executive Director
National Resource Center for Permanency and Family Connections
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Mary Keane |
Aileen Rosario
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Gary Mallon, DSW is the Julia Lathrop Professor of Child Welfare and Executive Director of the National Resource Center for Permanency and Family Connections at the Hunter College School of Social Work in New York City. For more than 35 years, Dr. Mallon has been a child welfare practitioner, advocate, educator, and researcher. Dr. Mallon is the Senior Editor of the leading professional journal, Child Welfare, and the author or editor of more than twenty-one books. His most recent publication is Working with LGBTQ Youth: A Youth Worker’s Perspective, published in 2010 by CWLA Press. In the same year, Dr. Mallon was named the Child Advocate of the Year Award by the North American Council on Adoptable Children. Dr. Mallon earned his doctorate in Social Welfare from the City University of New York at Hunter College, was awarded an MSW from Fordham University and a BSW from Dominican College. Dr. Mallon has lectured and worked with child welfare systems extensively throughout the United States, and internationally in Australia, Canada, Cuba, Indonesia, Ireland, and the United Kingdom.
Mary Keane now considers herself first and foremost a mom to her adopted and pre-adoptive older kids who came out of the foster care system. She still has four of them living at home while the others are off and living on their own! Two of the full time workers are now involved in the field of finding permanent homes for teens in foster care. In her full-time position Mary is a Family Permanency Advocate for You Gotta Believe! – the older child adoption movement. She works to find homes for teens in care and living in residential treatment settings with a special focus on the LGBT population.
Aileen Rosario is a former foster care youth who found her permanent family at 17 years old. Aileen had been in and out of foster care since the age of 7 and finally found the love and family she longed for in the home of Mary Keane. Finding permanency has inspired Aileen to aide other youth in finding their permanent families. Aileen currently works at Graham Windham Residential Treatment Center as a Permanency Expediter and AWOL Worker.
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Resources |
- We Interrupt: Waiting Teens Speak – Part 1 and Part 2
Listen to what youth in foster care in Minnesota have to say about permanency in their lives. This production was made possible by Minnesota Department of Human Services.
- Adoption Chronicles™
An Adoption Chronicle™ is a professional one-on-one video interview. It is personal, not clinical. Through Adoption Chronicles™, children and families are empowered to become active participants in the determination of their future. They are given the opportunity to speak for themselves…to share their hopes and dreams, their likes and dislikes, and what having a family means to them.
- She’s ‘a Wonderful Parent’
The Journal News. By Keith Eddings. (June 24, 2007)
18 kids have found refuge as gay woman opens up her home.
For additional related resources, please visit the following NRCPFC webpages:
We also encourage you to access the resources available on the National Resource Center for Youth Development website.
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