Success Stories This Year's Graduates

Despite losing both parents to drug addictions — her father died when she was nine and her mother was unable to care for her and her eight siblings — Ramona Ramirez considers herself “blessed.” She points to the fact that Foster Care to Success and grants have covered all costs as she pursues higher education and her current employer’s flexibility allows her to work full time while attending the University of California-Riverside. When Ramona graduates in December 2012 with a degree in business administration, she will be 25 — considerably older than many of her fellow students — and her degree may be even more meaningful to her. Cheering her on as she accepts her diploma will be her seven-year-old son who has motivated her every step of the way.

“I wanted to make sure I could provide for him and that he didn’t have to go through the struggles I did,” she says adamantly. “I want so much for my son, and I want to break the cycle of our family. I want to give him what I didn’t have.”

Ramona downplays the years she spent in foster care, saying that her large family surrounded her with love. But she still grew up without her parents, and says there have been times she’s been particularly angry with her mother. “Even after my dad died from a heroin overdose, she wasn’t willing to change her life for her kids.”

Ramona eventually gained custody of her then 14-year-old sister, who continues to live with her five years later. And, unlike the example set by her own mother, it’s clear that Ramona takes motherhood very seriously. “I have to sacrifice a lot of time now that I’d like to be with my son,” she explains. “I have to work and go to school. But he plays soccer and we work on his reading and math. He’s so tall and really smart,” she says proudly. She says her son’s father is still in the picture, and that someday she will explain to her child why she grew up in foster care. But in the meantime, she is demonstrating on a daily basis what it means to be “blessed” – a mother who is willing to do anything out of love for her child.