And once in the system, the court procedures make it hard for them to get their children back. It is hard for them to understand what is going on. By just educating them we can keep them from having their kids end up in the system. By just educating them we can keep them from having their kids end up in the system. Ocampo describes some of the difficulties parents have once their children, especially teenagers, are in the foster care system.
Latino parents are very protective of their kids.
They believe in strict discipline and use corporal punishment as part of caring for their children. All of a sudden, when a child is in a foster home, the child is overwhelmed with the freedom that foster parents give them. They are in a setting that they have never see before. They have more freedom at school, more freedom to stay out late at night, better schools, better food, more affluence. Normally in a traditional culture girls may not date until they are 17 or 18, but in this culture they can go out when they are as young as 10 or 11.