The writer gets into makeup after feeling ugly as a child. People respond well to her new look, and she finds she needs a full face to go outside. [more]

Alexus is attracted to girls from a young age. She hears enough homophobia to keep her bisexuality quiet, but eventually grows to accept her whole self. [more]

Tayia reviews the TV show This Is Us, which features a family that decides to foster a child. She notes how things can go wrong even when people have the best intentions. [more]

Alexus reviews Jim St. Germain's vivid story of growing up rough in Brooklyn and straightening his life out during a stay at Boys Town, a residential facility. [more]

Psychotherapists Sylvia Lester and Marina Stolerman of The Fostering Connection give tips on how to make a house or apartment a home and how to live on your own. [more]
[LESSON PLAN]

The writer adopts a tough persona, squelching his own feelings. He alienates his girlfriend, loses his son, and almost ends his life. He finally gets real and turns his life around. [more]
[LESSON PLAN]

Shateek sees no future for himself, so he messes up in school. Helped by a few counselors, he applies himself just in time to graduate and get into college. [more]

Inspired by the activist teens in Parkland, Florida, Carolina takes a bus to Washington DC to protest gun violence and the lack of laws preventing it. [more]

J.G. has a sad life and sometimes acts out in unhealthy ways. She's put on way too much medication, which doesn't feel like a solution. She tries to change her way of looking at things instead. [more]

Andrew notices from an early age that he does not identify with anything heavily gendered, neither masculine nor feminine. On the Internet, he discovers the concept of "non-binary" and finds himself. [more]