SANTA CRUZ SENTINEL
SUNDAY, JANUARY 20, 2013 C3
EXTRA
FOSTER YOUTH PROGRAM
Giving foster children a leg up
Donation provides funding, support services at Cabrillo College
By KIMBERLY WHITE
kwhite@santacruzsentinel.com
APTOS — In a world filled
with financial aid forms,
upcoming class registrations
and looming deadlines, higher
education is a world unto its
own for even the savviest of
incoming college students.
But what may be simple
stumbling blocks for some
can become impenetrable
walls for former foster youth,
many of whom lack the financial and emotional support of
their peers.
Nearly 150 community colleges in California have programs geared toward ensuring former foster youths’
success, according to the California Community Colleges
Chancellor’s Office. Among
them is Cabrillo College,
which last year launched
its Foster Youth Program
thanks to a $50,000 gift
from an anonymous donor.
Those funds are used to provide scholarships and grants,
cover administrative costs
and support student mentors
who themselves are products
of the foster care system.
At Monday’s Board of
Trustees meeting, members accepted a second,
$50,000 gift from the same
donor, which was used to
provide services over the
fall to dozens of students.
Of the $100,000 total, about
$61,300 has been used for
scholarships and grants and
$38,700 for program support, according to Melinda
Silverstein, executive director of the Cabrillo College
Foundation. Cabrillo’s Vice
President of Student Services Dennis Bailey-Fougnier,
said participation increased
from 19 students last spring
to more than 50 in the fall.
Only 20 percent of foster
youth attend college compared with 60 percent of
their peers, according to
statistics compiled by the
Institute for Higher Education Policy. Of those, only 5
percent obtain degrees or
certificates compared with
20 percent of their counterparts. The figures come
from a 2005 study, the most
recent year available. BaileyFougnier said those figures
“may have gone up a little,
but not significantly.”
About 125 students have
identified themselves as foster youth at Cabrillo, making
them eligible for state services thanks to a bill signed in
2010 that extends services
through the age of 21. Before
that, “they were just getting
the boot when they turned 18.
It’s like a bird getting kicked
out of a nest when they don’t
know how to fly yet,” said
Joseph Watkins, a 20-year-
old who now mentors about
half a dozen students as part
of the program.
When he moved here from
San Luis Obispo to attend
Cabrillo, he found himself
adrift, with no support network that he could tap into
to receive help. But he made
his way through, and eventually got involved in student
government, with the goal
of obtaining a double degree
in philosophy and political
science to help make policy
changes.
“I like the fact that I’m
able to provide for others,”
he said, adding when he first
arrived at Cabrillo, “I didn’t
have people to guide me and
I had to do it on my own. It’s
great that there’s something
like this for them.”
Follow Sentinel reporter Kimberly
White on Twitter at Twitter.com/
kwhite95066
SAFETY FIRST
JON WEIAND/SENTINEL
A computer monitor at Courtesy Cab in Watsonville is
shown with a bullet hole through the upper left corner of
the screen.
SHOOTING
Continued from C1
take a phone call just before
the shooting.
Whilehewasonthephone,
a bullet entered through the
open door, struck a computer monitor and hit the wall,
business owner Richard
Camperud said.
The employee, who was
not injured, ducked under a
desk, Camperud said.
Eli Mendoza, who lives
on Second Street and owns
a business in the neighborhood, said he heard some
young people running
around outside just minutes before he heard the
gunfire.
Mendoza said Saturday
AT A GLANCE
HOMICIDES IN
SANTA CRUZ COUNTY
YEAR
2010
2011
2012
NUMBER
15
12
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he wasn’t surprised by the
violence.
“This happens all the
time here,” Mendoza said.
“It’s a little turf war with
the gangs.”
Anyone with information
can call police at 831-7683352 or the anonymous tip
line at 831-768-3544.
Follow Sentinel reporter Shanna
McCord on Twitter at Twitter.
com/scnewsmom
MATTHEW HINTZ/SENTINEL
SANTA CRUZ — Eddy Ernes, a Santa Cruz Beach Boardwalk ride technician, scales the Giant Dipper roller coaster Tuesday
afternoon during a scheduled maintenance operation.
often succeed in modern
American society not is
spite of their psychopathic
tendencies, but because
Continued from C1
of them. In fact, it goes on
to suggest that developing
trumpeting the outrageous
more of your inner
comments and actions of
psychopath might help give
high-profile psychopaths
from professional offenders a boost to your career. A
lack of empathy can come in
like Ted Nugent and his ilk
handy if you’re a trial lawyer.
to Goldman Sachs CEO
Ruthlessness is a very useful
Lloyd Blankfein and his
Wall Street brethren. In this tool if you want to climb the
regard, the news media have corporate ladder or compete
in the open market. You’d be
become bounty hunters for
surprised how far you can
celebrity psychopaths. And
go in this world untethered
readers love it.
from that emotional sack
Knowing what we
of cement known as a
now know about Lance
conscience.
Armstrong — to take
No one is claiming that
this week’s example of
unfathomable bad behavior anyone who is rich is a
— is there a more plausible psychopath, or that you
can’t become rich without
way to explain him other
resorting to the psychopath
than identifying him as a
mindset. But the free
psychopath?
market clearly loves high“The Wisdom of
functioning psychopaths,
Psychopaths” makes
provided they stay on the
the point that people
BAINE
right side of the law. Every
time we praise some mogul
or politician for their “killer
instinct,” we’re glorifying
psychopaths. What are
these popular reality-TV
competition shows but a
showcase for psychopathic
behavior and not-so-subtle
propaganda for the winat-all-costs mentality
that is the oxygen that
psychopaths breathe? We
see it in Washington, on
Wall Street, in the realm of
sports and entertainment.
But where is that line
between a society that
exalts psychopaths and
a system that is itself
psychopathic? We’re still
capable of censure against
cheaters and liars such as
Armstrong and the steroid
users in baseball, so there’s
a sign of cultural antibodies
at work.
I’m not ready to give up
on the cherished idea that
CHOICE
Continued from C1
for the mother is wrong.
Opponentsalsosayabortion
procedures should not be subsidized by the government.
Saturday’s audience of
about 60 people listened as
keynote speaker Lupe Rodriguez, the public affairs director for Planned Parenthood
Mar Monte, talked about
how more effort needs to be
put forth to ensure women
continue to have the freedom
to abort a pregnancy.
Rodriguez said the average
cost of $580 for an abortion
and increased restrictions
placed upon abortion providers have limited access to
abortions in recent years.
She also cited waiting
periods in some states and
“bias counseling” by doctors
as other hurdles for women
seeking abortions.
Rodriguez said 2012 was
one of the worst years for
access to abortions in the
JON WEIAND/SENTINEL
Lupe Rodriguez of Planned Parenthood Mar Monte speaks during the 40th Anniversary celebration of the Roe v. Wade decision in Santa Cruz on Saturday.
country.
“We have less and less
providers, and they’re getting reimbursed at the rates
of the 1980s,” she said. “This
is potentially really devastating.”
Jennifer Hastings, a doctor of 15 years at Planned
Parenthood Mar Monte in
Santa Cruz, said protecting
a women’s right to have an
abortion is important.
“Certainly access to choice
is fundamental to the health
of our community and to the
health of individual women,”
Hastings said. “Unfortunately, that right is constantly
threatened.”
Follow Sentinel reporter Shanna
McCord on Twitter at Twitter.com/
scnewsmom
hard work, talent and pluck
are all that’s needed to get
ahead in this world. But as
so many middle-class people
who work hard and play by
the rules find themselves not
only failing to get ahead, but
often are slipping behind, it’s
a comfort to think that good
people struggle in a system
that rewards bad people.
So, I choose to believe
that’s why I’m not rich.
Of course, I could just
be a lazy, hypocritical slob
without either talent or
guts. There’s a compelling
case to be made there too.
Contact Wallace Baine at wbaine@
santacruzsentinel.com.
Mike Schweyer
Visit:
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