Kevin: I actually had never planned on being a foster parent. Connie wanted to foster a child, and since then we've had over 200 boys.
Connie: We had our own children. I love working with children. I also was a teacher at the time, and, because I love working with children I also felt the need to foster children.
Kevin: The kids out there they were having problems. It was because of the home lives they've had.
Kevin: And if you look in the homes, especially in a whole bunch of communities where people don't have money, and so on and so forth, in most cases, there's also not a man in that house. I believe that a father needs to be there to show a boy how to become a man. And I didn't say tell him, show him. It's very important they see us do the things that we want them to do. You know, you don't have to tell them to do as I say, you tell them to do as I do.
And I tell the kids, "I wanna help you. We love you, we wanna help you. We didn't bring you here to put you out. We didn't bring you here to fail with you. We brought you here to help you, but you have to be a part of this. You have to want the help. You've got to care about yourself also. Whatever happened to you in the past, it's unfortunate, but your future depends on you. You are in control of that more so than you'd think. And my job again, is not to be your friend, but to help you orchestrate how you're going to get there."
And that's exactly what I set out to do. We can make a difference, but we have to hang in there to make the difference. We got to stand there because people have turned their back before on these kids, and you need someone on your side to go through this process because you can't do it by yourself. You need someone that's gonna have your back. Heather has gotten know us, and we've gotten know her. There are times I may not say things quite the right way. There are times I may not do things quite the right way. But Heather knows us. She knows our home, she knows what our intentions are, and she stands in the gap for us. Boys Town's the best.
