Orangewood Scholarships Take Youths Beyond the System

As a teen-ager, Jane seemingly lived the good life. In school, she excelled in class and was popular.

But at home, life was different. Her stepfather, a respected and successful land surveyor, had been abusing her sexually and physically for years.

She felt at the end of her rope. Her mother did not offer support and ignored the abuse.

“I didn’t want to ruin their lives, so I blamed myself. I finally decided to run away,” recalled Jane (not her real name).

“I was emotionally disturbed. I was to the point of self-destruction. I was starting into drugs to escape . . . I could have killed myself.”

Today, Jane, 20, has almost no contact with her parents. She is a clerk-typist at a county agency. She shares an apartment with a co-worker, will soon begin community college classes and dreams of a career in criminal justice.

Jane is one of three young women who have been awarded $1,000 college scholarships from a special trust fund established recently by the Orangewood Foundation. The foundation, established less than a year ago, raises money to help abused and neglected children.

The scholarships, foundation director William Steiner says, are for deserving former abused children who have been able to establish lives independent of the social services system.

The scholarship fund is needed, says Elizabeth Tierney, who chaired the committee that selected the three winners, because too often children who survive the social services system still require help.

“The whole point is to assist these young adults who have gone through the whole system,” Tierney said. “The support system is no longer there for them, but their needs still go on. We are responding to them in the absence of a family.”

The home experiences of Diane were similar to Jane’s. She, too, was subjected to physical and sexual abuse by her stepfather. Diane said he initially vented his rage against her mother, but turned his attention to her when she was 9.

Diane (not her real name), now 19, ran away from home when she was 15 and survived for a year on Orange County streets, at times living in cheap motels or “crashing” at friends’ homes.

“It was the typical cheesy runaway story,” she said.

Diane bounced around from halfway houses to temporary shelters for troubled teen-agers. She finally landed at a facility run by Olive Crest Treatment Centers, a private organization in Santa Ana that houses abused and neglected children.

At Olive Crest, Diane found stability until she was able to make it on her own. Today, she works mornings in a child care program. She, too, recently began classes at a community college.

Carol’s painful ordeal also began when she was young. She was the youngest of 12 children and said she was abused and molested by her father from an early age. The state removed her from her home when she was 8 years old. For 10 years, Carol (not her real name) remained a ward of the state and only two months ago did the 18-year-old finally venture out on her own.

Carol was moved from home to home after she was taken from her parents. At one point, her grandmother gained custody of her and life improved. But that lasted only a year and her problems resurfaced when her grandmother died.

Carol was taken in by an aunt and uncle. There, troubles “started all over again” when her cousins molested her. Eventually, she ran away before “turning myself in” to social workers.

Before she moved to Los Angeles to live with friends two months ago, Carol had lived at Olive Crest for 2 1/2 years.

Despite her long ordeal, Carol graduated from high school with honors. She also modeled, and even won a talent contest for her singing and dancing.

In the fall, she plans to begin classes at the American College of Fashion Design in Los Angeles and hopes for a career in fashion merchandising.

Although all three young women are now on their own, they still remember the crippling experiences of their childhood. But they also are grateful to the people who helped them overcome the trauma of abuse.

To cope with the fear of abuse, Jane spent much of her time as a teen-ager sequestered in her room. She wrote poetry and fantasized about another world. It took one particularly bad encounter with her stepfather to finally force her to run away.

Although her parents tried to get her back, Jane, with the help of social workers, fought for her freedom. The social workers arranged for her to go to an emergency shelter. There she met Ethel Herman, a woman who Jane says saved her.

“She brought me out of that whole thing. She showed me that it was not my fault . . . that I was not bad,” Jane said. “I learned that you don’t throw kids against the wall and beat them until they are black and blue. I really feel that she saved me.”

Herman, who has cared for about 600 children in her home during the past 20 years, said she had to help Jane overcome her fears before the young woman could recover from her traumatic home experiences.

“She was not assertive. She just needed to be convinced that she didn’t have to be afraid,” Herman said.

Jane stayed with Herman for a few months, then went to live with Dorothy Kelly, an Orange County foster parent.

‘Out of My Shell’

“Mrs. Herman helped me emotionally. But Mrs. Kelly pushed me out. She brought me out of my shell and prepared me to go out on my own,” Jane said.

Kelly, who now lives in San Bernardino, says she considers Jane a daughter and is proud of her for overcoming her childhood problems and succeeding on her own.

“She didn’t think she was worth anything. I would have to stroke her,” Kelly said. “(Jane) is a good listener and that’s one reason she’s come as far as she has. She is a loving and compassionate person.”

Jane can’t remember the last time she talked to her parents, but she talks to Herman and Kelly regularly. She even spends some weekends in San Bernardino with Kelly.

“I learned a whole lifetime in one year. If it weren’t for them, I’d be dead. I was so close to hitting the deep end,” she said.

Diane now spends 3 1/2 hours each morning caring for preschool children. On a recent blisteringly windy morning she played with the youngsters in the playground. The terms “Honey” and “Baby” were added to almost every phrase as she coaxed them to put on jackets or prodded them to climb swings.

Used to Hate Kids

Her attitude used to be the opposite.

“I used to hate kids, but I really love them now. I can side with a lot of them. I can react to their situations because of what I’ve been through,” she said.

After bouncing around and getting involved with drugs and alcohol, Diane says, she finally managed to find stability. At Olive Crest, a couple she refers to as “Grandpa and Grandma” helped her find it.

“Grandpa and Grandma” Ted and Nellie Kirkoff were the house parents at Olive Crest for Diane and Carol. The girls learned to trust them and learned to return the love that the couple extended to them.

“I was pretty fortunate because they were so great. They were the only reason I stayed,” Diane said.

Nellie Kirkoff says it was Diane’s self-reliance that was a key to her success.

“She’ll always make it on her own because she keeps her chin up no matter how things work out. She really knows her own mind,” Kirkoff said.

Helped HEr Mature

Jeanne O’Bryan, the case manager at Olive Crest, agrees that Diane’s determination helped her mature.

“I see (her) as a real success story. She has developed independence and has proven how determined she is to make it on her own,” O’Bryan said.

Carol, who spent the most time in foster and group homes, is still a little shaky about making it on her own. “It’s scary sometimes,” she admitted.

However, O’Bryan says, Carol has the ability to adapt to her new situation and will have a successful career one day. She says the Orangewood Foundation trust fund scholarship will give Carol the needed financial assistance to free her to concentrate on school.

“(She) is a very responsible young lady. She just needs help to get started,” O’Bryan said.

Despite their emerging independence, each of these young women still harbors a tinge of regret that they cannot be reunited with their parents.

Too Much Bitterness

“I wish we could (reconcile) but there is too much bitterness. They still feel I was wrong. I still love them like crazy, but circumstances, their constant denials, just wouldn’t make it work,” Jane said.

Diane said, “My mother told me her marriage was better without me. She said I was an incorrigible child. I wasn’t. She’s wrong. There’s nothing to that marriage and there never was. It’s kind of sad, really.”

Carol said, “My parents are doing better now. But I can’t forget what happened. It’s always there. But it makes me feel good that I was able to survive.”

Another common bond the three share is that they learned the hardships of life relatively early. They also learned that without their own determination, they might have lost hope altogether.

“Everything I have, I’ve earned. Some people look down on others, but I don’t. I don’t have a weird attitude towards people,” Diane said.

Jane says she never lets herself forget that she could have been one of the thousands of children who do not survive the system forced upon them because of abusive parents.

“I know kids from the system who didn’t make it,” she said. “They are back on the street. Just having learned to live has been enough. To me, that is a great accomplishment.”