The Lost Children of Wilder

The Lost Children of Wilder

"The Lost Children of Wilder" is a book about how the foster care system failed to give children of color the facilities that would help them lead a somewhat normal and protected life. The story of Shirley Wilder is a sad one once you find out what kind of life she had to live when she was a young girl. Having no mother and rejected by her father she has become a troubled girl.

Shirley Wilder was rejected from foster care because she was black. The system failed to place children of color into these homes because they weren't white, Catholic, or Jewish. I cannot even believe that this went on years ago. Just because you are of a different race meant that you could not benefit from the system. This is absolutely ridiculous that children could not get the proper care and supervision that they needed. One example of race discrimination is of a girl from my town. She was not able to go to our local swim club because she was black. I know this has nothing to do with foster care but both of her parents died and she was adopted by a white family whom she babysat for. They wanted to take her to the swim club but she was rejected because she was black. She sued the club and was awarded $200,000. I think she was lucky to have gotten the money but nothing can undo what it feels like to be discriminated against.

"Under New York's Family Court Act, treatment was the legal justification for taking troubled children into custody when they were found delinquent or Ð''in need of supervision'" (Bernstein 32, 2001). To me, Shirley was definitely a delinquent in need of supervision. Just because of her race she was not able to receive the things she needed. According to the law though, she was qualified for treatment but of course there are always loop holes to get around certain terms and conditions of the law.

I think a big problem came from the foster-care workers. "Some foster-care workers said that matching skin shade was a legitimate way of easing a child's adjustment to a new environmentÐ'..." (Bernstein 113, 2001). In some situations I do believe that it would be hard for a child to adjust to a certain kind of environment but that does not mean that the only thing that should be matched up is skin color. If a child needs a home and their skin color happens to be different from the adoptive parents, so