Kentucky School Principal Jason Smith walked out of his office one day and saw a girl from the 6th grade sitting on a chair by the door—suspended for inappropriate behaviour during lunch.
One can only imagine how much delinquency and mischief Smith had seen throughout his 14 years in charge of the school, but something about the girl struck him that day. Asking whether she thought such behaviour was acceptable at a restaurant, Raven Whitaker replied she had never been to one.
Where she had been was in and out of foster homes for most of her life, where foster parents had made plenty of promises they were unable to keep.
“At that point, I had felt like she just needed a hand, needed help,” Smith thought to himself. “I recognized that she needed something to go in her favour, maybe for once, that it hadn’t gone in her favor in the past, but she just needed somebody to help her.”
After discussing it with his wife Marybeth, she believed there was something special about Raven.
The couple had struggled with infertility for years, and had previously failed to turn foster children they’d hosted into candidates for adoption. After discussing the matter with Raven’s case worker in 2015, they heard that they too could foster her. They also talked with her personally about the matter.
With their doors opened, Raven wasn’t sure it was going to turn out any differently; although she admitted to the fact that the welcome was immediately and detectably warmer than past homes.
However, it wasn’t long before the love and sincerity of the couple won her over, and the three became an official family in October 2017.
With a principal in the house, Raven improved her performance in school, graduating and moving forward to attend the University of Kentucky.