PORT ST. LUCIE — Five families will emerge from a small courtroom in St. Lucie County next week, newly created through the bonds of love and adoption. They will be the most recent of CCKid’s projected 75 total adoptions for the 2024-2025 year – a success by any measure.

But not all children in Okeechobee and the Treasure Coast – the area covered by CCKids child-welfare community – will have won the adoption lottery this year.

Three children featured on CBS 12’s Forever Family segment aged out of foster care this year without an adopted family. One more turned 18 the year before. Now young adults, Mya, William, Haleigh and Gerald are officially out of foster care.

All were featured on the adoption news segment over the past few years, having made a decision to seek family from the airwaves. They were all teens when their segments first aired, and some were aired more than once.

Mya, a cheerful, loving girl whose segment first aired when she was 13, loved to help her house parents cook. She was interested in science and African American history and said she saw herself pursuing a future in criminal law. She turned 18 in 2023.

William described a love of graphic design and a proclivity toward engineering. He aged out of care last month.

Gerald, who turned 18 in August, used his time on the show to crack jokes:

“Where do fish keep their money?” he asked. The answer, of course, is in a riverbank.

They all had one goal: To be the child someone wanted to raise as their own.

Finding adoptive homes for teens isn’t easy, but it’s not impossible. Since Forever Family first began working with CCKids and its adoption provider Children’s Home Society, five of 11 local teens featured on the show have successfully found homes.

In total, 24 of 39 children of all ages featured have been adopted.

So what happens to Mya, William, Haileigh and Gerald and young people like them who don’t find their forever homes by age 18?

Thanks to Florida’s Independent Living Program and CCKids’ Road to Success Staff, young adults can continue to receive resources, guidance and financial support through age 21, or, for those with developmental challenges, 22.

But nothing replaces family.

CCKids is nearing the end of its yearlong 25by2025 campaign to recruit 25 foster homes by January. So far, only about half of that goal has been met.

If you have ever thought about fostering or adopting a child or a teenager, now is the time to act. Call 772-873-7800, and ask for Jerra to get started.