After months of applications and waiting, I have decided to attend Washington and Lee School of Law!  Washington and Lee is a very small program, offering one of the lowest faculty/student ratios of any law school in the country.  The law school also boasts some very exciting opportunities for clinical experience. Washington and Lee is located in Lexington, VA, about three hours from Washington, DC.  Dan and I are looking forward to living a bit closer to home and moving back to a climate where we can enjoy all four seasons! I will be selling the house this summer and getting a jump start on school while Dan finishes his deployment in Baghdad. We are hoping he will join me in Virginia early next year.

       Although I am so excited about my transition to law school, I have mixed feelings about leaving my current position with Children's Protective Services in Texas.  I am an adoption worker, which entails preparing waiting children for adoption once the courts have determined that they cannot go home.   I am responsible for matching my children with adoptive families and helping all parties make the transition.  We place with relatives, foster parents and often families who are completely unrelated to the case.  Most of the time we place the children with families in Texas, but we also place with families from all over the country.  My most recent trip was to place four children in Pennsylvania and I am headed to Oklahoma in a few weeks.  I am awed by the responsibility of selecting "forever families" for these children, but have never experienced anything more rewarding. I hope my future as an attorney can compete, because as stressful as this job can be, my life's greatest accomplishments are wrapped up in what I have been a part of these last two years. 

     Some interesting facts about adoption in Texas:

• As of July 31, 2003, there were 3,617 children waiting for adoption through the Texas Department of Family and Protective Services (DFPS).

• Of these,1,263 were African-American, and 1,245 were Hispanic. 95 children had physical disabilities, 1,378 had learning disabilities and 1,551 had emotional problems.

• DFPS placed 2465 children in adoptive homes during fiscal year 2002.

• Of the children placed for adoption by DFPS during fiscal year 2002, 31.8% were white, 29.9% were African-American, and 36.1% were Hispanic.

• Of the children placed for adoption by DFPS during fiscal year 2002, 16.9% were emotionally disturbed, 20.3% had mental retardation, and 2.2% had physical disabilities.

• In the state of Texas there are 16,000 children in foster care and only 7,000 foster homes.

Click here to view a public service announcement about kids waiting to be adopted...it's really sweet. The first two boys pictured used to be on my caseload a long, long time ago!