Wednesday, February 20, 2013

The Latest HNN (Henry News Network) Update

Today makes one month and five (5) days since I resigned my position as a Paralegal at the South Carolina Department of Social Services.  It still seems a bit weird to say that, but I've gotten used to it.  While I had a plethora of reasons for my decision (of which I will not publicly discuss on a blog), the main reasons were family and grad school.

My wife Jenn and I adopted a baby girl, Selah, in October 2011, who is now 16 month old as of yesterday.  I often ended up working 50-60 hours a week, with no overtime pay, and missed out on bedtime, play time, and dinner time--in other words, some key times for Daddy/Daughter time.  Thanks to the holiday months of October, November, and December, I've been able to hold her, play with and talk to her, help her learn to walk, and see her take her first steps.  I realized during that time that if I continued at this job, working the hours I was working, I would miss out on many other firsts in Selah's life.  And while I appreciated having a job and the work I did in prosecuting child and adult neglect and abuse cases in Family Court, my job, in my opinion, took me away from my family.

In addition to family time, Graduate School played a major role in my decision to resign.  Now that I am almost finished with the General Ed requirements, the majority of the classes I need to complete my program are offered only during normal work hours, not to mention my practicum and internship.  I enrolled in my program in 2011--the same year we adopted Selah--and took a school break from June 2012 to December 2012 because I was needed more at home.  Due to that break, I have less time to finish my essential course work.  The only way I can effectively complete my schooling and get my Master's Degree in Psychology and my Ed. S. in School Psychology is for me to go to school full time.  Which I can't do if I classes are only offered during work hours, and I still can't do if I am putting in 12-15 hour days at the job.

So, due to those two main concerns, I resigned in December 2012, and left SCDSS in January 2013.  While I am happy that I no longer have DSS stress in my life, I do wish the agency the best in it's future endeavors.

As I prepared to leave the agency, I didn't have a chance to say thank you to a number of co-workers, legal professionals, and especially the Family Court Judges of the Ninth Circuit.  I have learned from all of you, argued with you, complained with you, and and laughed with you. More importantly, I consider myself blessed to have the chance to serve the families of Charleston and Berkeley Counties with you.  Thank you for your dedication to the families of the Ninth Circuit.

With that said, now that I am a private citizen again, I got something to say...

(Jump on Soapbox):

The majority of employees and case managers at DSS work long hours for little to no money compared to their counterparts in the private sector, mainly because they care about the families and children of our state. Not everyone at DSS is the enemy, and I wish that the media provided fair and balanced news coverage when it comes to DSS.

In a perfect world, there would be no need for DSS, because child abuse and neglect would be unheard of, and families had access to resources necessary to provide for each other.  It would also mean that churches and the private sector would be doing more to help their communities and Government could get back to its main tasks of punishing evil and protecting my rights.  Unfortunately, this is NOT a perfect world, people don't have access to necessary resources, Government is too stretched out thin carry out its actual functions, and churches don't have the money or volunteers to carry out the mandate to take care of orphans and widows.  And sadly, we still have plenty of legit cases of child abuse and neglect in our society.

The case managers and legal professionals at DSS are doing the absolute best they can with what they've been given, and again with little pay and little support and resources (both physical resources and employees).  The last thing on a DSS employee's mind is "messing up your life."  Cut them some slack, and tell them 'Thank You' for their hard work sometime. They are people just like you.

(Jumping off soapbox)

That felt pretty good there.  Thanks for indulging me.  I'm gonna have to blog more often now...