Former foster youth interning in Congress this summer will get a little help from the Sara Start Fund for Foster Youth, a new venture announced today by the Congressional Coalition on Adoption Institute (CCAI). With partners including Macy’s, Bloomingdale’s, Under Armour and matchbox food group, the Sara Start Fund is designed to help former foster youth get a start on their professional lives by providing a stipend for a business wardrobe and informal career counseling. The Phillips Collection art museum will provide special enrichment activities.
The Sara Start Fund will work in tandem with CCAI’s Foster Youth Internship (FYI) program, which places former foster youth in congressional offices to advocate for the 463,000 youth currently in care across the country. Interns in the program must attend college and demonstrate leadership skills on campus.
“One of the main goals of the FYI program is to remind policymakers and those around them that youth who grow up in foster care are like any other youth in that they have hopes, dreams, and most importantly, enormous potential. The Sara Start Fund is one way we can invest in that potential and what I know for sure is that society will be the ultimate beneficiaries of this investment,” said Kathleen Strottman, CCAI’s executive director.
Click here to read the full press release.
Congressional Coalition on Adoption Institute 
This is wonderful. If it had not been for the fact that one of this year’s Angels in Adoption took me under her wing and bought my entire internship wardrobe, with several hundred dollars of her own money, I would not have been able to intern with FYI in 2003. Unfortunately, not every foster child has an Angel standing by to help them with this sort of expense, so it is awesome that this fund has been created to assist wouldbe interns.