National & International

Metro & State

John Archibald
Local Government With Kyle Whitmire
Conservation: The Behavior Gap
Magic City Marketplace
The Price of Poverty
Price of Poverty: Time Banks
Price of Poverty: Involuntary Flextime
Price of Poverty: Buy-a-Meter
Birmingham-Southern's Struggles: a Student Perspective
Price of Poverty: Food Deserts
Remembering Cecil Whitmire
Occupational Tax Settlement
Child Care Subsidies at Risk
Robert Bentley
Vestavia Hills: Library in the Forest
Hotel Tax Dispute
Oil Spill and Hair Sausages
Anne Frank and Me
Jefferson County Commission Runoff
On the Line: Ask the Mayor
Midwives in Alabama
The Future of the Jefferson County Commission
New EPA Sulfur Dioxide Rules
Alabama Gubernatorial Primary 2010
Alabama and the Oil Spill: Seafood Safety
Alabama and the Oil Spill: One Family's Story
Bike to Work
The ASO plays Carnegie Hall
Alabama and the Oil Spill: Hurricane Season
News Features Archive

90.3 WBHM -- This month we're airing a special series as part of our year-long mental health project. This series is called Raise Your Voice: Stories from Teens. Public radio producer David Sommerstein gave recorders to three young women in New York and asked them to document their daily lives. Today, we hear from Brittany laBrake.

For a lot of kids in high school, the opportunity to live in your own apartment is like a dream come true, a long awaited chance for independence and freedom. That's what Brittany thought. She was living in a foster home for five years; but, a month before her 18th birthday, while she was still in high school, she signed herself out of foster care to live on her own. Brittany moved into an apartment with her boyfriend, Gary. She wanted to live her life independently, but she found out it's not that easy.

In Birmingham, Gateway operates an Independent Living Program that helps to smooth the transition for young adults who are "aging out" of foster care. Program coordinator Jean Burton tells WBHM's Tanya Ott that often, the cards are stacked against the kids, especially since a high number of them have a diagnosable mental illness.

Editor's note: This is our lastest piece in a year-long commitment to covering mental health issues in Alabama. You can learn more about our "Making Sense of Mental Health" project and find local mental health resources -- as our commitment continues throughout the year -- inside this website.

Making Sense of Mental Health

North Country Public Radio -- produced the Raise Your Voice teen series.

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