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Here is adrian baker, a story this in our turning point series. To the left, to the left it goes to the left, to the left had. Everything in you own in the box to the left. But the chorus goes, dont you ever for a second get to thinking you are irreplaceable. Millions girls are made her resilience in her challenging times in her had life. It helps me stay strong, keep your head up and better days will come and you will find somebody else. I feel like people should be more open minded that its not the kids fault that they are in foster care. Reporter for the past five years she has beecare system in area, once her mom was unable to financially support her and her siblings. When i was 10 and 11, i was actually confused and shocked. Like, look. You are in the foster system. Their rules, what they say, you are not my mom. I missed had my mom and brotherd it was different. At that time, i literally would just pray. Reporter this time she found family in her care giver. Her 9th foster home in five years. Its hard to feel at home when you are always moving. A triplet, the pandemic made it more difficult for her to see her siblings. Its challenging for kids not in stable placements and in visitation. If they have visitation with their parents, it came to a halt in the covid season and now, its like, its up in the air. Reporter she is an estimated one of 400,000 in the foster care system, 54 of them are black or latino and the pandemic hit that group the hardest. Those groups are facing insurinsur insurer insurmountable challenges. And couple it with the pan democrat i we have to be understanding and take action. A lot of people dont understand its not that easy to be a foster kid. Like, at school, i do not say im a foster kid, i relate to my foster families as brothers and sisters, mom and dad. Because i feel its uncomfortable how people stereo type foster children. Reporter now as the country be braces for a new wave of the pandemic, theres some feeling isolation in a whole other level. During the covid, i started journaling. I be writing in there about my family and what i hope in the future and that they are all reporter with family court shutting down, visitation suspended a reported increase in domestic and child abuse and simply nowhere to go for many of them. Thousands of foster kids around the country are bearing the brunt of a world paralyzed by coronavirus. Some children have had to live in other homes, waiting to be reconnected and reunified with their parent. Reporter Lyndsay Collins is the ceo of first star, a nonprofit that has focused on created and offering support systems to propel foster youth like azaria in to higher education. Is the pandemic adding to the trauma and extending that time to be viable members of societity . Theres a sense of increased anxiety happening among many youth in the system. Especially your teenage ers in care. They are not in the system because they have committed a bad act. They are in the system because their parents or their family unit could not take care of them. Reporter we met azaria earlier this year at the height of the pandemic. Separated from her family and her school. Like many students Remote Learning trying to make the best of it. Me justoi i have to do. Getting good grades. Staying focused and having good behavior. Was just one thing that i just had to just teach myself. Reporter as millions children across the country have difficulties with online learning, those in some communities are struggling with online learning. I advocated for a laptop, i knew i would need one, and the time, i did not have one with. So i made sure that i told my social worker and emailed my attorney too. Dang, having a laptop for school is the best thing you can ever have. For foster youth, its really important. Lack of connectivity and lack of devices to access classrooms and then, lack of desire and want to attend classes. Because of the pandemic. To significant learning loss within the population of foster youth. Im a student that like to be more hands on and like talk to the teacher about problems that i dont understand. Reporter reduce the country in camden, new jersey, this young woman is trying to navigate the system. I dont tell many people my situation. I only tell a few that are like close to me. Only a few people now and then. For others im a normal kid going to school, just with regular problems. Reporter she was 11 years old when she and her Three Sisters were separated after her mom was arrested. They came in and they were like, we need you guys to come with uses and i was just like, okay. I did not understand. I was just like, i was not going back to my parents. Reporter her family is undocumented and immigrated from honduras, her mother was eventually deported, forcing her three children in the foster care system. Like at the beginning me andmy sister were separated and for a few weeks and we came back to another house. Another foster houses and we were there for two years the four of us together. We search a couple families to adopt out, it never worked out and then my two younger ones got adopt period and me and my big sister didnt. In the past six years i have been to five houses. I dont like moving. I hate it. Its like you get used to people and school, to friends and then they just come out of nowhere and are like, okay, you are moving. Reporter since then she and her older sister have been working to find a forever home together. I have been working in adoption. Getting adopted with this family. Reporter in 2017, sisters received welcome news. A family wanted to adopt them. But since then, laws and regulations due to their residency status have slowed down the process. Now they are on a path to citizenship. But with the pandemic, it has all been put on hold. Everything slowed down because of covid. Teenagers in care spend the most time in the foster system. With the pandemic, those students that had a chance to be adopted or to end up in guardianship, had to wait even longer. Reporter for these kids the one thing they crave is the one thing they dont have, stability. I want to be a teenager, get my drivers license, and drive and work and go out when i want. Its been tough. I see my friends and they are like, im driving now and im like, i want to drive. Reporter she points to her big sister, jennifer as her rock. If we didnt have each other during all this time, it would be very difficult. She has been through way worse than me. And like the fact that she just walks around and smiles and makes me smile, its like, i enjoy that from her had. That she is happy. Reporter despite her positive outlook, she wants everyone to know theres scars we dont see. Kids really get lonely, i guess. Kids know how to hide it. They need that support for you to tell them. In a while, you l them and you are there for them. Reporter with a year left in high school, she has big dreams of what is ahead. When i picture my future, i think i want to go for immigration lawyer had or an actress. I would love to be an actress, just be out there. This is just, just a little obstacle that i have and i will be who i want to be when i get older. Like this is not going stop me. Reporter if theres one word to describe kids like this, its undefeated. When i think of myself in ten years, i see me already starting my career. Doing good, focusing on my job in friends and family. Reporter a zmpzaria was abl break through and see her biological mop. A break through she was waiting for for years. Not every foster child is going to go through a good experience luke i have been through. Reporter now, as they take steps in to figuring out young adulthood, both are focused on giving back. I will love, i have a good life, i would love to be a Foster Parent to be honest and just help kids. Our thanks to adrian. Coming up, shaq first taking the nba by storm. And now taking on the american foster care system. In a whole. Now roomba vacuums exactly where you need it, and offers personalized cleaning suggestions for a clean unique to you and your home. Roomba and the irobot home app. Only from irobot. Kisave it slimeball. Ting her congestion. Roomba and the irobot home app. Ive upgraded to mucinex. We still have 12 hours to australia. Mucinex lasts 12 hours, so im good. Now move kim, no mucinex lasts 3x longer for 12 hours. Satchel paige was still dominating batters at 59. At 52 celia cruz was still winning grammys at 77 john wheeler illuminated our ideas of the universe at 70 and roger crouch was 56 when he first went into space your best is yet to come heart monitors that let your doctor watch over you, just like you watch over your best friend. Another lifechanging technology from abbott, so you dont wait for life. You live it. Shaquille oneal may have retired from the Basketball Court but he is not shying away from a different spotlight. Spearheading a movie that looks at the abuses in the foster care system. A project he is hoping will be a game changer. Reporter its february 2020. Just weeks before the world would shut down from covid. And we are with Shaquille Oneal at the pan african Film Festival in l. A. They are here for the movie foster boy, a movie about the failings of the american foster care system. Produced by a real life super hero. Shaq, and known by fans as superman. While no one anticipated how a pandemic would bring the country to a standstill, shaq has not stopped doing a lot of good. We were able to reconnect this fall to discuss the film and how 2020 has taken a toll on so many, especially the foster suspect. I had a couple of relatives pass away from covid. Its a tough year from everybody. Reporter while shaquille has championed the causes of children. He said that producing this film opened his eyes. Its a guy that came to me and was, like you want to know something about the foster care system . I thought i knew everything about it and i didnt. When i got the information it was not really good. Didnt like what i see. I was like, people should be aware of this. Because im not a foster kid. Ive always had my mom and dad, what if i didnt . How does that feel . So, if we can bring awareness to the situation try to help them make change, thats what im always about. I see you reporter the film tells the story of jamaal, imprisoned after years of abuse in the system. What made you want to take the stories that you heard of neglect and the plight of so many foster youth in the country and get it on a screen and make a movie out of it . Because that shouldnt go on. Shouldnt go on. All the stories hurt my heart. By age 8 a cruel fate. Found a meaning in loss. Ripped from the comfort of a family and taken by cops. It shouldnt happen. And that can mess with you mentally. Reporter er for the rest of your life. Forever, forever. And that doesnt need to happen. Like, when a persons down, what is below bottom . A lot of people dont come back from that. You have to show, i love you. You have to show them the way. Reporter Peter Samuelsson produced foster boy with shaq. It was important for him to provide more awareness about what he calls a broken system. 9 of american foster kids go to college. 3 earn a degree. Our kids, 89 go to college. Its transformative, in the end, theres nothing matter with the kids and a lot the matter with the grown ups and the system. Reporter of the to approximately 400,000 kids in the foster care system, 23,000 age out without ever finding a perpendicul permanent family of their own on. And face teen pregnancy, suicide and incarceration. This is the last great civil rights struggle that never had a day one. They dont be vote. They are children. Im sure a lot of pressure has been put on the kids. Research shows that smiling releases chemicals in your face and your brain, helps you feel a little bit better. So when i meet a person, i just try to make them laugh. But, a lot of the kids, when reality kicks back in, the laugh was cool for a second, when reality kicks back in, they go back to the space. Reporter in a year of pandemic proportions, even a giant can be shaken. You know, theres a saying that theres certain things you will never forget. Reporter the hall of famer has had his own share of heartbreak. His sister passed a year ago from cancer and they are family sharing tributes on social media. Certain things that you will never think could happen. Never will think my little sister would go before me. My Perfect Little sister. And then, the kobe. In spite of grief, he believes that projects like foster boy andthe advocacy around it can be a game change er. I met a lot of the kids that just hold stuff inside. They just hold it. Nobody understands, nobody cares. I think once they know that there are people that understand and care, they are going to start open up. And i hope this story teaches the world about compassion. We need compassion more than ever these days. Reporter where can ddid you this heart, this humility and desire to pour out olove . Its from listening to my mother and father, i just want to make people smile. Its not going to happen right away. We are working on it. To all the foster kids, i love you. You have inis a gram, twitter, call on me, i will do whatever i have to do to make you smile. What is your legacy . I had the answer for the world, i would give it and i would give it for free. What would i like my legacy to be for the next generation . I would like to leave a blueprint of what made me what i am today. Its honor, compassion, respect and understanding. If the world was like that, it would be a better place. Foster boy is streaming now. Up next, the little boy and his big message. Love is greater unanimothan cov. A its superior greasecleaning formula gets to work faster, making easy work of tough messes dawn takes care of tough grease, wherever it shows up. Scrub less, save more. With dawn now, theres skyrizi. Things are getting clearer yeah i feel free to bare my skin, yeah thats all me. Nothing and me go hand in hand nothing on my skin thats my new plan. Nothing is everything. Woman keep your skin clearer with skyrizi. 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We are picking up groceries that people donated for the pantry. We have got this. This. This. And this. You would not know it, but this sevenyearold was not always this cheerful. Bullied at a young age, this maryland boy fought back by spreading love. Handing out care packages with food and toiletries to neighbors and when food poured in, he and his mother opened the food pantry. Sharing nothing but good times in the tough times. Good for him. Thats nightline for this evening, catch our full episodes on hulu, see you back here tomorrow. Thanks for the company, america, good night. Youre constantly on the go, on the clock, and on your way. Hang on a second. Whats the rush . Know the speed limit, go the speed limit, and slow the fast down. Go safely, california