Pubdate: Sat, 02 Jun 2007 Source: New Haven Register (CT) Copyright: 2007 New Haven Register Contact: http://www.nhregister.com Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/292 Author: Maria Garriga, Register Staff Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/youth.htm (Youth) FOSTER CHILD WINS WRITING CONTEST NEW HAVEN -- A longtime judge for the annual Connecticut Elks essay contest says she never read an entry quite like the one from William McCleese, a seventh-grader at Celentano Museum Academy. The contest required students to explain why "Drug Abuse Is Not Cool." In less than 200 words, William, 14, described how drug addiction had forced his parents to give him away. "In all my years, I've never read an essay like it," said Debbie Angell, a contest judge and chairwoman of the Drug Awareness Committee of the Connecticut Elks Association. The Elks received 5,000 contest entries in Connecticut this year, she said. "From this point on, this essay will go national," Angell told the New Haven Board of Education in May as it recognized William. William speaks for many children. The state has 6,300 children living in its custody; drug abuse is a factor in two-thirds of these cases, said Gary Kleeblatt, spokesman for the state Department of Children and Family Services. Half of these children return to their biological parents, but for many others, the parents lose parental rights for the children's safety. Deeply troubled parents sometimes surrender their parental rights to the state. Their children have no home to which they can return. Such children are often bounced from one foster home to another as state workers struggle to find a permanent placement. "I don't remember my parents. I don't know their names. I still love them," William told a reporter. "William is a survivor of the best kind, the kind that survive without being angry," his foster mother, Mae Gibson-Brown said in an interview at her home. In her living room hangs a painting of herself done by a now-deceased friend. In it she has curly hair, warm brown eyes and a megawatt smile. William also has curly hair, the same smile, the same gentle brown eyes. Gibson-Brown, 69, believes that knowing where you are from is critical to having a sense of self-worth and dignity. "It's who you are and whose you are," she said, with a strong emphasis on "whose." Gibson-Brown keeps active as a gospel singer and storyteller who shares stories of growing up in the poor South. In her living room sits a cake box of cotton she plucked from bushes on an Alabama roadside. Gibson-Brown also keeps a plastic bucket of coal from West Virginia, where her father worked as a coal miner, and a plastic juice bottle filled with red mud from Macon, Ga., home of her mother. Their legacy is what moved her into becoming a foster parent, although she had already raised six biological children. For Gibson-Brown, a retired New Haven schoolteacher who sings in a gospel group, finding William was serendipitous. More than five years ago, an acquaintance who worked with Jewish Family Services saw Gibson-Brown in concert and asked her if she knew of any potential foster parents. The acquaintance sent a packet with photographs of foster children. Gibson-Brown said a granddaughter looking through the photos called her attention to one in particular. "She said, 'Look at this little boy. He looks like he could be part of our family.' We put his picture up on the fridge." Just over a year and three months later, Gibson-Brown drove to Washington to meet a young boy who needed a permanent home. It was the boy on her refrigerator. "I think that bond was created for me by God," she said. She is passionate about getting him involved with extra-curricular activities. William loves soccer. He sings in the church choir at the Agape Christian Center and volunteers as an usher. His favorite hangout is the library, where he devours magazines about motorcycles and dirt bikes. Gibson-Brown stunned William at Christmas with a Sony PlayStation Portable for the latest video games and a bass guitar. "I was about to scream when I saw the guitar, and I almost ran out of the house when I saw the PSP," he said. Gibson-Brown is particular about the video games. "No guns or blood," William said. "We just don't allow it." Gibson-Brown said. William's favorite activity is what he mischievously calls "fun times." He likes to sneak attack her with hugs and kisses, usually when she is distracted doing something else. He gave a demonstration. "I must be getting covered in boy cooties!" Gibson-Brown hollered. William laughed and hugged her close. - --- MAP posted-by: Steve Heath