Instilled: The Values Learned that Led a Resident to Success

Growing up, Jenny wasn’t raised with any understanding of God. She hadn’t ever been to church, she didn’t know anything about Him, she didn’t even know if He was real. But now as a teenager, yet another incident had happened to her, and she knew she couldn’t stay with her biological parents any longer.

She prayed to a God she wasn’t sure even existed, pleading that if He would take her away, she would follow Him for the rest of her life.

A few weeks later, her prayer was answered: the Division of Family and Children Services brought Jenny away from her harmful environment and into the care of GBCH&FM.

Jenny was welcomed to our Palmetto Campus and began assimilating to her new life, one that was organized and set-up to teach each resident skills and values that would benefit them for the rest of their lives. Like many residents who initially come to GBCH&FM, the routines weren’t familiar to Jenny and took time to adjust to, but she came to appreciate them.

“As a child coming from a chaotic environment, the schedule was comforting,” she explains. “Having the same routines and the same structure on a daily basis, it felt better than anything I ever experienced as a child.”

The daily and weekly schedules also provided opportunities for Jenny and other residents to learn about Christ and attend church, something she took advantage of every time the church doors were open. It was through these opportunities that Jenny learned about the God Who not only heard her prayer and provided a way out from her environment, but Who also paid the ultimate price for her sins and made a way for her to spend eternity with Him in Heaven.

Through her time at the Palmetto Campus, Jenny was surprised to find something else, something she didn’t think she would have again anytime soon: family. She learned the importance of having a family and support system, and that family can be more than just where you’re born into. Anyone can become family.

“We weren’t blood-related, by any means,” she shares about her group leaders and the other girls in her cottage. “But we were still family.”

Jenny’s life had completely turned around. Here, she didn’t have to worry about being harmed or abused again. She could just be a kid.

After about two and a half years at the Children’s Home, Jenny was graduating high school at the age of 17. Her biological parents’ rights had been terminated so they no longer had any rights to visit, contact, or make decisions for her. But from this loss, she gained a Resource Family who loved her and welcomed her in as one of their own.

Jenny had her eyes set on becoming a caseworker in a nursing home-type setting, where she could care for elderly residents and be a source of comfort and encouragement for them. So she enrolled in the University of West Georgia to help make this dream a reality.

Even though she was no longer a resident at GBCH&FM, her Resource Family also lived in Palmetto, so Jenny could still be close to campus. She even worked each summer as a campus lifeguard while she was in college.

In 2009, she graduated college with a Sociology degree and Biology minor, ready to earn her dream job. But with an economy that was still reeling from a recession, job openings—especially in the social work and elderly care fields—were either scarce or completely non-existent.

“At the time, that area was not hiring,” Jenny says. “I didn’t have a career or anything for six months after graduation.”

Fortunately, she connected with a fellow church member who worked at the Georgia Department of Agriculture. The Department had an opening and he thought Jenny would be an excellent candidate.

She applied and was hired as a Scientist 1, helping to ensure the food that shoppers buy from grocery stores is safe to eat and free from pathogens. Even though it wasn’t a field she was initially interested in, she quickly grew to love her job.

Today, she still works at the Georgia Department of Agriculture, but now as the Atlanta Food Safety Laboratory Manager. Her hard work ethic, organization, and perseverance that developed from her time at GBCH&FM laid the foundation for her to excel and climb the ranks at her workplace.

“Jenny has been an integral part of the Georgia Department of Agriculture’s food safety program for the past ten years,” writes Jenny’s long-time supervisor Dr. John Shugart, State Chemist of Georgia and Laboratory Division Director. “Her dedication and love for her job is evident in her everyday work and her ability to overcome obstacles to serve the needs of the people of Georgia. She is a leader at work and in her community. We are lucky to have her work with us at the Georgia Department of Agriculture.”

Outside her professional accomplishments, Jenny has been married for nearly ten years now, and she and her husband have three beautiful children together. She shares how many of the things she learned at the Children’s Home, she still lives out today, some of which are intentional, others more unintentional.



“For the longest time, I would do the laundry on Thursday just because I felt like, ‘Oh, it’s Laundry Day!’” she laughs, speaking on one of the unintentional habits she’s kept. “But I know how to take care of my home because of the Children’s Home. They taught me how to cook, they taught me how to clean, I learned total life skills there.”

Many of the values that were instilled in her while at the Palmetto Campus, she now strives to pass down to her own children: the importance of God and church, the strong work ethic and discipline that develops from structure, and the significance of family.

Jenny attributes much of the success she’s had and much of who she is today to the people who impacted her while at GBCH&FM, like Ms. Kimber Scott, our Central Intake Program Coordinator who reviewed Jenny’s file and accepted her into care; Jenny’s group leaders; and her Resource Family. “But it wasn’t just one person,” she adds. “It was the whole organization. What the organization meant and means to kids like me.”

While the environment and trauma Jenny came from is not something anyone should go through, she can reflect back with gratitude, seeing how her life was completely changed.

“Every time I sit down and think about it, I can say I am very humbled and thankful for the experience of living at the Children’s Home.”

Your support makes stories like Jenny’s possible. Thank you for giving children and families a place to call home. You can learn more about our Residential Care program at www.GeorgiaChildren.org/Residential.