Hope Meadows: Real Life Stories of Healing and Caring from an Inspiring Community
This is the stirring story of the kind of village it takes to raise troubled, unwanted children. In 1994, the first families moved into Hope Meadows, a former military base in central Illinois. Academic activist Brenda Eheart (sociology, Univ. of Illinois, Urbana) developed this multigenerational alternative to the traditional foster care system. In return for adopting up to four special-needs children, parents receive free housing and a salary of $19,000 a year. Senior citizens obtain low rent in exchange for volunteer and mentorship work, and a therapist lives on-site. A collection of profiles of the various and sundry families, this book grew out of the veteran journalist-author's story for the Chicago Tribune in 1996. Chapters brim with testimonials and poignant case studies; selection criteria and placement failures are de-emphasized. A longer-term study of the outcomes of this project would have been useful, but media and political leaders already support this social experiment as a cost-effective approach to profound social problems. This month, Hope Meadows will be featured on The Rosie O'Donnell Show and, in May, in the debut issue of Rosie magazine, so stock up. Highly recommended for public libraries and child welfare collections. Antoinette Brinkman, M.L.S., formerly with Southwest Indiana Mental Health Ctr., EvansvilleCopyright 2001 Reed Business Information, Inc.