From Passion to Promise
Lauren Mendez entered the foster care system in Stanislaus County at age 15 and aged out at 21. The “system” had a huge impact and sparked her passion to engage others to positively transform the system. Lauren, now 27, is currently the Youth Engagement Project (YEP) ambassador mentor with the Child and Family Policy Institute of California (CFPIC). In this article, she shares with us her advocacy role and a promise to engage youth to help inform policy and practice.
I have been with the CFPIC-YEP since October 2016. Over that time, I have held many roles, such as the Stanislaus County YEP ambassador, CDSS YEP ambassador, and project associate. The Youth Engagement Project is where I started my professional career as a child welfare system advocate.
My advocacy for and work with youth started my senior year of high school, when I joined Community Youth Connections with the Center for Human Services in Stanislaus County, where I worked with youth who were homeless, runaways or in crisis to get them connected to our community by volunteering and attending the Youth Empowerment Summit, Out of Darkness Walk and the AIDS Walk San Francisco. My time with Community Youth Connections taught me how to be a leader and brought out skills I did not know I had. I joined California Youth Connection and was a part of the Stanislaus Chapter. My journey with California Youth Connection gave me my passion for advocating for those without a voice in the child welfare system.
The Youth Engagement Project’s (YEP) goal is to create a space for authentic youth engagement where young people are at the table at the beginning of practice and policy decision making. During my time with YEP, I have supported many ambassadors in project management and providing feedback to CDSS and county child welfare systems. The YEP is a partnership between CDSS and CFPIC to improve child welfare policies, programs and practices by building capacity for youth engagement at the state and local level. Currently, YEP is supporting 25 ambassadors and 14 counties. Some of the work I have done includes: partnering with CDSS’s Transitional Aged Youth (TAY) Unit to put on the TAY Conference; providing feedback to the Center for States on how COVID affected young people in foster care; working with Sacramento YEP ambassadors to provide training on authentic youth engagement; working with young people in care; providing input on the development and implementation of the Family Urgent Response System (FURS) at inception; and speaking at the California State Human Services Committee Senate Hearing on kinship care. The Youth Engagement Project and UC Davis Human Services recently partnered to have a listening session for ambassadors to give their expertise and lived experience on CFT/CANS.
I am passionate about positively transforming the child welfare system and those who work with the children and youth in care. I have always had a passion for curriculum development and training. What I strive for in my work with young people is to build trainers with lived experience in the child welfare and juvenile justice system. I want to inspire purpose and passion into young people affected by these systems just as people have inspired me and led me to be the professional I am today.
To learn more about CFPIC-YEP, you can contact the director at margo.fudge@cfpic.org
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