The Importance of Family Documentation for Displaced Youth

The Importance of Family Documentation for Displaced Youth

Octavia Fugerson, M.Ed, Ph.D - Juneteenth 2020 Dedication

Knowing Where You Come From Impacts Self Identity 

      There is a need for youth and young adults who engage the child welfare system to know where they come from. Information about one’s family contributes to knowledge of self and self identity. We’ve heard how knowing where one comes from may provide clarity to where one is going. The history, values, and ideas gained from engaging family or one of shared origins, provides support that informs and inspires. Family documentation influences one's technique or style and connects one to a shared experience, against an uncertain world. Insight related to where one's dreams and motivation is likely to arise, with one's understanding of self, especially when rooted in a collective, such as family - or the historical socioeconomic status of an ethnic group. Life decisions are made easier and one's strengths and weaknesses become more apparent when one takes information that comes from beyond one social collective, such engagement with the field of child welfare, and acknowledges roots in the natural collective, such as one's biological family.

       While the field of child welfare made it clear that I stood apart in society, based on my life's experiences, my family shared information that brought relativity, a sense of belonging, and greater understanding of my capabilities and place within a collective I identified with. To have access to information about my family- from my family, was to have a broader, more empowering, perspective of my living situation and my definition of self. The narrative my family shared felt anti-racist, and shared perspective to some of my resistance. For me, family's documentation provided a knowledge of self, rooted in moral, social and spiritual principles that informed and inspired my natural ways of being. It is that empowerment and passion for positive youth development that encourages me to share the benefits of family documentation for displaced, or disconnected youth- such as youth who have experienced foster care, homelessness, juvenile delinquency or migration.

Some of My Story

      I read the local community publication and learned more about the history of my family. My biological family had educated me on my history. The foster care system had educated me on my history. As a national youth advocate and motivational speaker, I had educated folks across the nation on my history. But it was something about having conversations with my biological family and seeing the documents in the possession of my family that revealed empowering things about my history, and expanded my story. I share my experience so that others who engage the child welfare system know the benefit of family documentation. 

      After being placed in foster care at the age of 14, then emancipating at 21 years old and serving as a foster care advocate, I had engaged my story differently than the average adolescent, who never experienced separation from their family. Professionals informed me of my social and economic status, as I received evaluations and assessments on how my life was affected by my home dynamics.

     The image of us, who are recipients of child welfare services, are influenced beyond the stories within our families. Engaging the family court, the foster care system, juvenile justice system, child welfare agencies, and community organizations, I learned that there were judgments of how families should engage and exist. I learned that my family did not sufficiently meet the standards the child welfare system had at all times. It wasn't until I engaged material outside the child welfare system that I learned why such was the case, in a way that did not make me feel like my family were the bad guys- with little to offer. Our family members provide experiential context that others, outside the community, may not be exposed to. Talking to my grandfather, Frank Fugerson, I was exposed to the value of family’s documentation.

      Naturally as I got older, I had many questions about my family, especially after I aged out of foster care. I was interested in how we got to the current place of our story. My curiosity grew not only from the gaps of knowledge related to family identification, like how my older cousin isn’t my aunt or historical residential geographic location, like how we got from the farm to the city, but my interest in my family history grew from the search for validation of goodness that the child welfare system, nor the education system did not portray to me about my family. I heard the system and I wanted to hear my family’s and my community’s side of the story. My grandfather’s story is a part of my story, the story of the importance of documentation, and the story of American Descendants of Slavery.

In 2017, I read “Best of Chatt Hills”, honoring my grandfather in their November, Issue No. 23.

The “citizen-run news service that connects, informs, and engages friends and neighbors of Chattahoochee Hills, GA” shared elements of my family story that I did not hear from the foster care system and some I did not hear from the mouth’s of my family.

The great gift I received from this document was details of my family member’s contribution to society, and the record of our American lineage, through descendants of slavery.

      After growing from the information I was exposed to about my family history, I wanted to plant the seed of the importance of documents and narratives about one’s family - outside of the child welfare system- to be recognized as informative for other disconnected youth . To me, “disconnected youth” are those of us who have been separated from our biological family, or origins. When youth who might have experienced foster care, homelessness, juvenile delinquency or migration, engage stories outside the child welfare system, they can learn more about who their families are, within the context of their communities. 

      The stories, outside the documentation the child welfare system provides, may extend beyond a deficit perspective, and empower young people with knowledge of family achievements and value. The documentation is important not only when related to one’s mother and father, but it is just as important for the other family members as well. For when a child is placed in the custody of the state, they are uprooted not only from their biological parents, but also family members including siblings, grandparents, aunties, uncles, and cousins.

The Benefits of Family Documentation

• Family documents inform youth of their family’s place in the larger historical picture.
• With each visit, those who engage their family documents can gain a different understanding. Having these documents allow the youth to refer to the material at their discretion, including at later times, with a more developed perspective.
• Young people can be empowered by narratives that are not rooted in a deficit perspective or bound to the assessments of health or child welfare professionals.
• Oral tradition contributes to young people having a holistic perspective. Young people should hear about the dynamics of their family and different family member’s character from people other than professionals of child welfare. The variety in the orientations to information about individuals allow room for diverse perspectives to emerge. For example, the people of my grandfather’s religious affiliates and community members, spoke differently than his children and other family members. His grandchildren also had a different perspective, as we saw him more at the stage of his elderhood than youth or adulthood. The child welfare system never spoke of my grandfather, or any of my family members, as those in the community had.
• Acquiring knowledge of one’s family history and origins provides a satisfaction in accurate storytelling and may develop a sense of responsibility to preserve the past for future generations.

Types of Documents

      Family documents may include vital records, financial papers, medical & insurance information, newspaper articles, journals/diary entries, or photographs. 

     I encourage the use of more social documents, like family albums and article pieces, than documents that may describe biological factors, such as medical records or genealogical records. While those records are informative, it is the social documents that add a level of context that the youth may be able to relate more to and gain more empowerment from. This is the case especially for youth who are American Descendants of Slavery, within the field of child welfare. With the influence of the illusion of white supremacy, there is a historical nature of efforts to distort the image of the population. The child welfare system is limited in their ability to use an anti-deficit approach and tell a story of strengths and values, when it comes to black youth. Family documentation reveals more elements that are likely not to be captured by the child welfare system, with the intent to share with disconnected youth. 

• Below you can find examples of documents that may inform youth of more of their family history.
• Birth certificates
• Adoption papers
• Citizenship papers
• Military discharge papers
• Photographs
• Trust documents
• Last will and testament
• Burial instructions
• Trust documents/ safe deposit boxes combinations
• Banking accounts
• Money Marketing accounts
• Certificates of Deposits (CDs)
• Pension System Statements
• Religious records
• U.S. Savings Bonds
• Stock Certificates/Bonds
• Real Estate Deeds
• Vehicle Titles
• Land and Property (tax) Records
• Rental Agreements
• Family Trees / Family names
• Newspaper and Magazines Articles
• Biographies
• Court records
• Obituaries
• Coroner’s reports
• Memberships to organizations
• Marriage certificates
• Occupational records
• School records
• Cemetery records
• Voter Registrations Record
• DNA Test

More of the Story of My Family’s Documentation 
     My experience with engaging the magazine article of my grandfather revealed to me the importance of narratives outside of what I received from foster care.
Through out my life, despite the seperation, I always respected my grandfather as a powerfully responsible man, who raised a large family and obtained land, during a time much danger was in the face of American Descendants of Slavery. However, it wasn't until after I aged out of foster care that I received the most valuable information from my family. Having access to my family's documents expanded my perspective, in the sense that I began to understand the value of who my grandfather/my family is to our community. 

     To spend time at my grandfather’s house is to be on the farm. Muscadines, peaches, pecans and the alkaline water are some of my favorite things on his land. Even till my grandfather's dying days, he was working his land, cutting trees and making sure the space was set for the fruit of his hard work to bear for his family and community. I spent a good amount of time with my grandfather as I felt lost dealing with the dynamics of graduate school. The indoctrination challenged me in ways I was not a fan of and when I felt bent out of shape, I ran to my family for a dose of origins, authenticity, and encouragement to remain true to my beliefs. To share the story of my grandfather and how knowledge of it empowers me, is to continue to bear the fruit of our family. Family documentation brought me comfort during distressing times and there I found strength to build my identity, and help others build their identity.

     During my struggles of graduate school, I was informed and empowered by oral interviews of my family history. I remember once asking my grandfather what part of Africa we were from. With the strangest look on his face, he told me we were not from Africa, that we were from Georgia. He shared details of my grandmother's Native American origins, and insisted his people had always been of America's land. My grandfather was proud of my educational accomplishments and happy that his granddaughter was becoming a doctor, continuing to bear fruit of his good work, similar to my cousins, aunties, uncles, sisters, brothers, mother and others of our bloodline and heritage. My grandfather taught me the importance of obtaining and owning land and always cautioned me when traveling through the state, outside my own territory. With that knowledge, I understood while there is space for me, not every space is for me. 

     Another important thing I gained from my family’s documentation was awareness of my heritage as an American Descendant of Slavery. My grandfather revealed to me the struggles of being a sharecropper and existing during the times of apparent Black Codes and Jim Crow Laws. While the article added to my source of information, not all the information provided aligned with the stories my family told. For example, in the article, my mother’s and grandfather's hometown was referred to differently in name than what I knew it as. Also, I didn’t find the details of slavery included. 

     The article did not capture the struggles my grandfather faced within his community, as well as he shared it with me, in his more seasoned years of life. My grandfather told me about the struggles of being a sharecropper in Georgia. He recounted multiple occasions of police officers taking his large sums of cash and personal belongings to their liking because of the belief that he was not supposed to have much. No retribution was made on my grandfather's behalf. He dealt with his experiences and advised his family accordingly. His advice, his words, added to my understanding of the article. 

       From the perspective of my grandfather, I was more than the negative outcomes associated with youth in foster care. From my family's documentation, I was capable of accomplishing great things, for those before me had done so, with great effort and natural talents. The intangibles I gained from reading this one particular article and hearing the multiple stories from my family, are valuable and inspire me to share, so other disconnected youth may gain similar benefits.

       It is essential to the development and health of youth in foster care that they build the narratives of who they are and where they come from, beyond the limited information that the child welfare system can provide. I encourage the use of oral traditions among families, in combination with documents outside what is typically used within the child welfare system to shift the narratives young people hear about their families. Young people who are displaced, or disconnected, or disadvantaged are more than the issues they face. It’s important that the details of life outside of trauma are shared with the youth so that they may have a holistic perspective of themselves, their families, their communities and their place in society.

To receive more information on how to engage
Family Documentation for the benefit of Disconnected or Displaced Youth,
Contact OFDevelopmentalServices@gmail.com

Peer Reviewed by Sherita Gordon, J.D.

An OFDS, LLC Article.