# data[].attributes.headline
"One For The Murphys" by Lynda Mullaly Hunt

# data[].attributes.subject
"One For The Murphys" by Lynda Mullaly Hunt

# data[].attributes.body
Twelve-year-old Carley Connors can take a lot. Growing up in Las Vegas with her fun, loving mother, she's learned to be tough. But she never expected a betrayal that would land her in foster care. When she's placed with the Murphys, a lively family with three boys, she's blindsided. Do happy families really exist? Carley knows she could never belong in their world, so she keeps her distance. But before she knows it, Carley is protecting the boys from a neighborhood bully and even teaching Daniel, the older boy of the three, how to play basketball. Then, just when she's feeling like she could truly be one of the Murphys, news that her mother is feeling better and wants Carley back, shakes Carley's world. Who will she want to live with? How will she find a way to love both the Murphys and her own mother? Read it to find out!

# data[].attributes.headline
"Finding The Right Spot:  When kids can't live with their parents" by Janice Levy

# data[].attributes.subject
"Finding The Right Spot:  When kids can't live with their parents" by Janice Levy

# data[].attributes.body
If you like "One For The Murphys", you should read this book that has a similar social issue. This story is narrated by a spirited young girl who is living with her Aunt Dane (not her real aunt) for a while, until her mother is able to care for her again. She experiences the emotional ups and downs of living in an unfamiliar home and being separated from her mother.

# data[].attributes.body
A man who delights in all things wicked, super villain Gru hatches a plan to steal the moon. Surrounded by an army of little yellow minions and his impenetrable arsenal of weapons and war machines, Gru makes ready to vanquish all who stand in his way. But nothing in his calculations and groundwork has prepared him for his greatest challenge: three adorable orphan girls who want to make him their dad.

# data[].attributes.headline
Foster Care Should Be a last Option-The New York Times

# data[].attributes.subject
Foster Care Should Be a last Option-The New York Times

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
" There Are Worse Things Than Foster Care," by Naomi Schaefer Riley (Op-Ed, nytimes.com, Nov. 21), doesn't account for New York City's incredible reforms preserving families and avoiding undue trauma caused by family separation.

The number of children in foster care in the city has gone from 45,000 - yes, 45,000 - to under 9,000 over the last two decades. In large part, this change reflects a recognition that the historical impulse to remove children from the homes of racially disenfranchised and impoverished families for the purported benefit of the children is often misguided and ultimately harmful to the very children the city is charged with protecting.

For good reason, the Administration for Children's Services has invested considerably in developing programs that support families to keep children safe in their homes and avoid separation. This approach often provides the best long-term outcomes for children.

There is significant room for improvement of the system, but the solution is not more removals.

Dawne Mitchell
Lisa Freeman
New York
Ms. Mitchell is attorney in charge of the Juvenile Rights Practice at the Legal Aid Society. Ms. Freeman is director of special litigation in the practice. To the Editor:
Naomi Schaefer Riley conflates a range of cases, portraying them as if most involve the worst forms of abuse. In reality, a large majority of cases are closely related to poverty. Poverty is often confused with "neglect," a notoriously vague category.

Ms. Riley is correct that drug use is often a factor, but it is misleading to act as if most of these cases involve dangerous levels of abuse. The overwhelming number of cases simply do not, a fact that is missed when cases are lumped together under "maltreatment."

Time and time again, as I describe in my book "Catching a Case," I saw children and families made worse off by child welfare intervention.

Removal to foster care is traumatic for children and often unnecessary. The families that are reported to New York City's child welfare agency, who are almost always living in poverty and more likely to be African-American or Latino, need services so that children can thrive.

In most cases, when parents are supported with needed services, children will be safe in their care.

Tina Lee
Menomonie, Wis.
The writer, an associate professor of anthropology at the University of Wisconsin-Stout, is a researcher who has studied child welfare, including the New York City system.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
Opinion | Foster Care Should Be a Last Option

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
" There Are Worse Things Than Foster Care," by Naomi Schaefer Riley (Op-Ed, nytimes.com, Nov. 21), doesn't account for New York City's incredible reforms preserving families and avoiding undue trauma caused by family separation. The number of children in foster care in the city has gone from 45,000 - yes, 45,000 - to under 9,000 over the last two decades.

# data[].attributes.body
This is a song written by a child in foster care. I think that this is important because it gives us a point of view of the child's feelings of being a foster kid.

# data[].attributes.body
This movie is a good movie to know what some foster children's life may be like.

# data[].attributes.headline
"Murphy's Three Homes" by Jan Levinson Gilman

# data[].attributes.subject
"Murphy's Three Homes" by Jan Levinson Gilman

# data[].attributes.body
Best for: Kids ages 3 and up. This is a cute story about a dog who has been moved from home to home-- and even into an animal shelter. He feels unloved, anxious, and worried that his troubles are his own fault. After all that moving, he finally finds a stable, loving family and discovers that he really is a good dog and deserving of a love.