For the People who STAY - Big Day of Giving 2026

After more than 20 years working with survivors of domestic violence, sexual assault, and human trafficking, I began to notice a pattern I couldn’t ignore.

The stories were different.
 The trauma was different.

But the ending was often the same.

No matter how hard we worked—how many grants we secured, how many late nights our teams put in, how deeply we cared—each year, the number of people in crisis continued to rise.

We were doing meaningful, life-saving work.
 But we weren’t changing the trajectory.

That realization stayed with me.

Because when you step back, you start to see what’s happening upstream.

93% of foster youth say they want to go to college.
 But by age 23, only 4% will have a degree.

Nearly 25% of people experiencing homelessness have a history in foster care.

This isn’t about motivation.
 It’s about what’s missing.

That’s why I founded AcademySTAY.

We’re not waiting for young people to fall into crisis.
 We’re building something earlier. Smarter. More human.

We provide safe, stable housing.
 We surround students with mentorship and community.
 We teach the life skills—financial literacy, healthy relationships, daily routines—that many young people were never given the chance to learn.

Because when those pieces are in place, everything changes.

One of our students came to us after aging out of foster care with nowhere stable to land.

She was doing everything right.
 Working multiple jobs.
 Staying enrolled in school.
 Sleeping on couches, moving from place to place, trying to hold it all together.

As one of our students said,
 “Having stable housing would allow me to focus on school without worrying about where I’m going to sleep.”

That’s the difference.

Before AcademySTAY, survival came first.
 After AcademySTAY, possibility does.

Once she moved in, everything shifted.

For the first time, she had a door she could close.
 A kitchen she could come back to.
 A place where someone would notice if she didn’t come home.

She started attending life skills classes.
 Built routines.
 Found her footing.

Today, she’s on track to graduate—and exploring a career in the nonprofit field, determined to give back to others walking a similar path.

This is what prevention looks like.

When young people have stability and support, we see different outcomes:
 Reduced risk of homelessness
 Lower likelihood of substance use
 Healthier relationships
 Higher rates of educational completion

For the first time in my career, I feel like we are not just responding to harm—we are preventing it.

Not downstream.
 Upstream.

We are moving the needle.
 We are changing the future.

And that is the work worth building.