Foster Care Collective — Elevate Voices. Ignite Change.

Beth understands that poor care in foster care does not end when childhood ends. It can leave consequences that follow a person for decades.

She knows this personally. Growing up in foster care and being adopted at nine shaped her understanding of grief, identity, attachment, belonging, and care. It also affected her emotionally and physically in ways she still carries.

As a licensed clinical social worker, she also understands the weight carried by caregivers and professionals trying to support children inside complex systems.

She helped create the Foster Care Collective because she believes we need more honest conversations about what foster care really asks of children, families, and the people who serve them. Her hope is to help advocate for meaningful change so children and caregivers today do not have to keep suffering long after the system has moved on.

Steve has spent decades connected to foster care as a foster parent, adoptive father, and advocate. Through those experiences, he has seen both the humanity inside the system and the ways children and families are often misunderstood or unsupported.

His perspective has also been shaped by raising and advocating for children with autism within foster care, where communication differences and developmental needs can easily be overlooked inside already strained systems.

He helped create the Foster Care Collective because he believes people connected to foster care should have a place to speak honestly, share perspectives, and contribute to conversations about change.

For Steve, this work is about helping children, caregivers, and families feel more understood and less alone inside the system.