Home. Family. Belongings. Familiar smells. Schools. Friends. Comfort. Hope. This is just a small handful of the things children all over the world lose when they are unexpectedly taken out of their home and placed into the unknown world of foster care.

Government statistics indicate that there are more than 500,000 children in the nation’s foster care system, with nearly half of them being older than 11 years. When possible, children are placed with relatives in order to create a smoother, less traumatic transition for the child. Often times, however, they are placed in unfamiliar foster homes and must therefore adjust to their “new life.”

In a perfect world, children would never have to be removed from their home. Unfortunately, the world is not perfect, and many children have to face crises that affect their lives substantially. Therefore, it is indescribably important to have these loving and compassionate homes willing to take in and care for these children temporarily.

Joe and Vanessa McCall have graciously provided children with one of these loving homes. A married couple just in their twenties, the McCalls have already opened their hearts to taking in foster children while they resided in South Dakota. Their decision to foster was pretty easy for the McCalls to make.

“Close friends of ours were foster parents and we were able to see firsthand what a difference it made in the kids’ lives,” Vanessa explains. “After discussing it, we decided that it was definitely something we wanted to get involved in.”

Throughout their five months as foster parents, they cared for a newborn baby girl, a four-year-old girl, a two-year-old girl, and a 14-month old boy. The McCalls shared that “The greatest struggle we had as foster parents was the separation when the children had to go home.”

When the McCalls moved back to Vanessa’s hometown of Williamsburg, PA in 2011, they contacted KidsPeace, a private non-profit organization that provides foster care, adoption and community programs to local surrounding counties. Their decision was made to pursue fostering once again, despite having to go through the entire licensing process for a second time. This includes 10-12 weeks of obtaining background checks, having a home safety check completed, multiple interviews, a medical exam, yearly training, and compiling a variety of documents.

“The whole process seems kind of overwhelming at first, but the more you go through it, the more you realize it’s all necessary,” Vanessa explains. “The training classes are very informative and helpful. The paperwork can be a little much at times, but it’s for the benefit of the kids in need to make sure they come into good homes.”

When children are initially removed from their home, it is likely a result of some form of abuse and/or neglect. While the goal for these children is typically to return home with their parent(s), when they’re in foster care, they need this “family atmosphere” to provide them with a sense of belonging, love, understanding, structure and consistency. And though being a foster parent is very rewarding at times, it can definitely be a challenge to deal with some of the behaviors that these children display.

“It is not easy, and there are definitely struggles, but making a difference in the child’s life makes it all worthwhile,” the McCalls believe.

Children in the foster care system have been forced to cope with circumstances beyond their control and deal with more traumatic life changes than most adults will ever experience. Families like the McCalls and so many others have opened their hearts and homes to these children in need and are learning how to help these kids have as normal a life as possible. More than ever, they need to know that they are loved and that they are somebody’s pride and joy.

As the writer Richard L. Evans once said, “Children will not remember you for the material things you provided, but for the feeling that you cherished them.” 

If you are interested in becoming a foster or adoptive parent, please contact KidsPeace at 814-693-7708.

Through various lineup changes and even a name change in the mid-1970s, the Nitty Gritty Dirt Band has continued to roll on and be an influence in the world of country music. The band, which performs May 20 at the State Theatre, formed in 1966 and released its first album a year later. It has produced hits such as “Fishin’ In The Dark” and “Mr. Bojangles,” and the groundbreaking album Will the Circle Be Unbroken that featured the band collaborating with the likes of Earl Scruggs, Merel Travis, Doc Watson, and more. The band has since done two Circle follow-ups that have included Johnny Cash, EmmyLou Harris, Chet Atkins, and Alison Krauss.

Drummer Jimmie Fadden has been with the band since it began — although he started out as a guitarist. He took time to talk about the group’s past and present.

T&G: It’s been 45 years since the band came out with its first album. What do you attribute the group’s longevity to?

Fadden: You arrive at a certain place in your career — any career — and look back on where it started and you can be amazed you had the opportunity to do what you got to do, and do something you loved. It’s like people who have made movies for a long time and still have an audience. It’s a real testament to the communication from all of us. We communicate well with each other. We share ideas with each other as musicians and artists.

T&G: How is the band different now?

Fadden: We’re a little tighter and wiser. We’re more selective. We understand our strengths and weaknesses better. It’s the evolution in any group — not losing track of where you started but giving yourself room to grow. Some musical groups grow at an alarming rate and can’t keep up with it. It’s incumbent upon us to be creative and to progress.

T&G: Do you see different generations of people coming to your shows?

Fadden: Yeah that’s nice to see. Of course, people our age are still going out to performances — that in it of itself is really great. We’ve heard that our concerts are where wives met their husbands. I heard that several times. It used to be people would say that their parents played our music when they were younger. Now, it’s more, “My grandparents played your music.” The material is what lasts — the words and music go beyond the artist. We’re out there just serving it up.

T&G: What did recording Will the Circle Be Unbroken mean to the group?

Fadden: For us, it was special. It was the coolest thing we ever got to do. I don’t know if we had a sense of purpose there other than to explain to people how important these people were in our outlook and our musical roots. They were essentially the groundwork for everything we knew about music. These people are the ones whose shoulders so many stood on. … All three Circle projects were great. Getting to hang out with those people, not just recording with them. We’ve stayed in touch with a lot of them and are lifelong friends with them. For me, hanging out with Merle Travis and Doc Watson would be like a rock musician hanging with Jimmy Page and Eric Clapton. We got to do something with people we admire and who have influenced us so dramatically.

T&G: Will there be a fourth one?

Fadden: Well, there’s always the possibility for that.

Award-winning playwright Anthony Clarvoe has loved theater for as long as he can remember. He has been a writer, actor, director and manager, not to mention he’s written about twenty plays in about twenty years and shows no sign of slowing down. His most recent written work of art is a futuristic play titled “Gizmo” which will be performed April 10-21 at Penn State’s Playhouse Theatre. Anthony shares with Town&Gown some of his experience and thoughts about his work and about the art of theatre in general.

T&G: What was it that inspired your creativity while writing Gizmo?

Clarvoe: The chance to work with Dan Carter and the company at Penn State. Writing something in a university setting for a community of students and scholars.  Writing a play with robots.

T&G: What do you love most about writing plays?

Clarvoe: Learning new things, using what I learn to make something new, then watching other artists make their work out of that.  And the times when that work helps an audience think and feel and laugh at things.

T&G: What has been your biggest accomplishment in your career?

Clarvoe: Having one!  It’s a competitive field, and artists in this country face a much more challenging environment than anywhere else in the developed world.  So to have spent most of my life as an American artist making art for American audiences, and to have achieved enough recognition to get more opportunities to keep doing it, that feels pretty good most days.  Tiring, but good.

T&G: How long does it take you to write a play?

Clarvoe: That depends.  Some I’ve written in a few weeks.  With some it takes years to figure out what I’m trying to do.  The first draft of GIZMO took about a year, with periods of intense work alternating with work on other projects, research, and general staring into space.  Now ask me how long it takes to REwrite a play..

T&G: What do you think is the most important ingredient in creating a successful play?

Clarvoe: The willingness to do the work it takes to write a successful play — however you define success.

Ingredients: 1 cup fresh basil leaves1/4 cup freshly grated Parmesan cheese, 2 T white wine vinegar, 2 T freshly squeezed lemon juice, 2 T chopped fresh parsley, 2 cloves garlic, 1/2 cup extra virgin olive oil, Salt & freshly ground pepper.

Directions: Combine basil, Parmesan cheese, vinegar, lemon juice, parsley and garlic in a blender.  Blend until the herbs are finely chopped.  With motor running, slowly add the oil and continue processing until the oil is fully incorporated in the mixture.  Add salt and pepper to taste.

To paraphrase those popular ads for Las Vegas: What’s happens at the Blue-White Game stays at the Blue-White Game. That’s usually been the case in the past, meaning what one usually sees at Penn State’s annual spring football game has little to do with what one eventually sees come September.

Over the years, a number of players who have dazzled fans during the intrasquad scrimmages are not heard from in the fall.

This year’s Blue-White Game, however, is different, and for obvious reasons. With first-year head coach Bill O’Brien, the Nittany Lions will unveil their new-look offense along with other changes the new coaching staff has implemented. All of which makes this year’s spring game one that could actually provide insight into what happens this fall.

Here are five things to watch for at the April 21 Blue-White Game:

Coaching Staff. With O’Brien calling the offensive plays and new defensive coordinator Ted Roof running the Lions defense, it should be fascinating to watch the different schemes and looks from each unit. It also will be noteworthy to see how quickly offensive plays are called — something that has been a problem for the Lions in the past few seasons.

Quarterbacks. No surprise here as it’s the third consecutive spring where the Lions have uncertainty at quarterback. Add in the fact that they’re learning a new offense (and the possibility that former Maryland quarterback Danny O’Brien could be coming to Penn State) and the race to be the top signal-caller could be even more heated. During his press conference prior to the first spring practice, Bill O’Brien said that Matt McGloin, Rob Bolden, and Paul Jones would each get a chance to practice with the first-team offense.

“It’s an open competition,” O’Brien said. “There’s no starter, and there won’t be a starter named until possibly the night before the Ohio game [on September 1]. There is no starter now at that position.

“We’ll keep a library on these guys, and when we go to make a decision on who starts the football game, it’ll be an educated decision and it’ll be a fair decision.”

Curtis Drake and the Secondary. The secondary may be the biggest area of concern for the Lions. The lack of depth is one reason why O’Brien moved Curtis Drake from wide receiver to cornerback. The Lions have two scholarship safeties on their roster in Malcolm Willis and Stephen Obeng-Agyapong. At the corner spots, Drake joins Stephon Morris, Derrick Thomas, Mike Wallace, and Adrian Amos, who saw time as a true freshman last season. Incidentally, two of Amos’s former high school teammates, defensive back Da’Quan Davis and receiver Trevor Williams, will be joining the Lions in the fall as true freshmen.

Tight Ends. O’Brien’s use of tight ends helped the New England Patriots reach the Super Bowl this past season, and the position will now likely take on added significance at Penn State. “One of the things about the tight-end position in our offense is that, second to quarterback, it’s really the hardest position to learn because we do so many different things with them,” O’Brien said.

Former linebacker Dakota Royer is now at tight end, giving the Lions some depth at the position. They also have Garry Gilliam back from a knee injury he suffered in 2010, and true freshman Jesse James from South Allegheny High School is enrolled in the spring and participating in practices.

Running Backs. Yes, the Lions have Silas Redd. But O’Brien will be looking for one or two backs to help give Redd some rest during the season. One player fans won’t see playing in the spring game is Curtis Dukes, who rushed for 237 yards last season. O’Brien is sitting the redshirt junior out to focus on academics. Derek Day, a senior from Central Dauphin High School, is the top backup in the spring, but O’Brien has hopes that incoming freshman Akeel Lynch will be able to contribute this season.

By Curtis Chan

Question: Why does a British-born ESPN X Games champion and his wife decide to make Central Pennsylvania their home when neither has any roots to the area and could live almost anywhere they wish?
For Jamie and Kerry Bestwick, it’s really not that complicated.
It’s true that on the surface the couple appears to be a study in contrasts. Husband Jamie’s occupation involves routinely defying Newton’s Law of Gravity on a bike while wife Kerry’s career as a yoga and Pilates instructor focuses on the mind and body. The couple resides in a thoroughly modern house that one might expect to find in Miami or Los Angeles, not on the outskirts of State College nestled among the more traditional Colonial-style homes.
But it would be a mistake to define the Bestwicks by such outward appearances. Instead, the two embody notions that wind up more often as clichéd quotes hanging on a kitchen wall than mantras for living a life.
Follow your heart. Keep the faith. Live your dreams.
Before Jamie Bestwick took first at the X Games seven times, before his three top finishes at the Gravity Games between 1999 and 2006, and before he placed first in every final standings of the Dew Cup from 2005 through 2010, he was an airplane-engine mechanic who loved stunt riding on his bike.
“My first BMX bike came at 10 years old,” he says. “In the years leading up to that, I would just go out and borrow my friends’ bikes and ride those. I just had to wait until my dad got me one for Christmas.”
For Bestwick, now 40, biking was a lifelong love. But making it a full-time vocation was something he wasn’t quite ready to do.
“I worked for 12 years. The biking thing, that was just a weekend hobby,” he recalls, adding that biking “was really what I wanted to do, but I’m a bit more grounded than most people. It’s not going to support the bills that come in on a monthly basis.”
His passion for biking never went away, even as he worked a day job and rode during his free time. But eventually the Bestwicks had to decide: take the safe route — keep working to pay the bills — or take a chance and become a full-time BMX rider.
“That’s the conversation we had in England walking our dog one day,” Kerry Bestwick recounts. “When I said to him, ‘What’s up?’ He said, ‘I’m fed up. I’m fed up with work and I want to see how far I can take my riding. I’ve done everything I can do in Europe again, again, and again. The market is in the States and I need to be there.’
“I said, ‘Well, why don’t you do it?’ ”
Kerry, 37, says they decided on a trial year. Jamie headed to the United States to pursue his career as a BMX rider while Kerry remained behind in England to continue her job as a preschool teacher. If riding didn’t work out, Jamie would return to England, satisfied that he at least tried to follow his dream.
Coming to America in 1998, his destination was Woodward Camp, a massive sports complex east of State College in nearby Woodward that’s a haven for bikers, skaters, gymnasts, cheerleaders, and snowboarders.
“I was just so captivated by the ride down,” he says. “When you take a ride down [Route] 45 in the early days of summer, it’s one of the most beautiful roads you’ll ever get the opportunity to drive down. The whole time I was driving down there, I saw these quaint little villages and it had this real appeal to me. I thought, ‘Why not?’ It’s a nice town. It was clean. The people here were very nice and friendly.
“I just enjoyed being here and that was the message I took back to Kerry in England: I found this place. It’s a great place for me to ride. The town is really nice and I think you’d enjoy it.”
With that, Kerry journeyed to the United States and the couple’s adventure began.
The duo didn’t move to State College right away, however. Instead, the Bestwicks lived in Aaronsburg in a house that Kerry didn’t even visit until she moved in.
“I fully believed in him and trusted his honesty and opinion,” Kerry says about Jamie’s house shopping.
The two say they enjoyed their stint in Aaronsburg. Looking back on it, Jamie says, “At the time, all it had was a gas station and that was it.”
“And that closed down!” Kerry laughs.
Still, Jamie says, “It was just a nice town and I didn’t feel being 25 minutes away from State College was that big of a deal because I always had to travel when I was in England.”
As Jamie trained and competed, Kerry had started to carve out her own niche in America. An avid yoga and Pilates student in England, she began pursing her own passion for the disciplines, becoming a successful instructor.
In addition to teaching regular classes at East Coast Health & Fitness in State College, she serves as a personal trainer and a sports-team trainer. The former cross-country runner even offers a DVD that can be ordered through her personal Web site, kerrybestwick.com.
Reflecting on their successes, the Bestwicks are adamant that it wasn’t an easy Cinderella story.
“We made huge sacrifices in our lives to follow his dream,” Kerry says. Both say it took a while to adjust to life in the United States.
“A lot of people always kind of say, ‘You’ve got it made. You live the life.’ All the typical clichés to anybody who’s been successful at doing that,” Jamie says. “I can quite honestly put my hand on my heart and say it’s the hardest job that I’ve had in my life. Yeah, I don’t have any time constraints. I make my own schedule, but it’s ridiculously hard to do. It’s both physically and mentally taxing.
“If you ask any athlete — a basketball player, a football player — they’ll say it’s the hardest thing they’ve ever done. The rewards are huge, but the work involved is massive.”
For the uninitiated, Jamie specializes in BMX vert, a freestyle discipline performed in a half pipe where riders execute feats of aerial acrobatics with their bikes as they jump and land.
And Kerry’s expertise in yoga isn’t so much water to Jamie’s BMX oil, but more like Zen chocolate mixing with biking peanut butter. Jamie readily admits that it’s Kerry’s support and guidance that are vital components to his success. “Kerry’s very good at seeing where my weak points are,” he says.
It makes sense since the two have been together a total of 21 years, ever since they met in a club in England and it was Kerry who made the first move and started talking with Jamie. They married two weeks before moving to the United States.
Jamie adds that Kerry has helped him master the mental aspect of competition. Kerry says, “A lot of the onus behind yoga is finding the calm.”
“When I’m relaxed, I’m very confident,” Jamie states. “I found this peace with myself and I know I have all the tools I need and I can do this. I don’t think there’s anything more stressful than being disoriented.”
Kerry says that’s when Jamie is most lethal to his competition. “When he gets on his bike and he’s got a smile on his face, it’s his day,” she says.
In the time since, Jamie has become one of the dominant names in BMX freestyle, if not the top name. Think Michael Jordan on a stunt bike and you get a picture of Bestwick’s place in the BMX world.
He was recently nominated for the 2012 Laureus World Action Sportsperson of the Year Award, along with five others, including American snowboarder/skateboarder Shaun White and surfer Kelly Slater. Later this year, Jamie will head back to England as part of the NBC crew televising the Summer Olympic Games from London, serving as a commentator on some of the cycling events.
Since arriving in Central Pennsylvania, Jamie and Kerry have started a family and become more integrated in the fabric of the community. They have a son, Samuel, born in 2005, and two British bulldogs, Lucy and George.
“When we had Sam, we realized this was a great place to raise a family,” Kerry says.
After living for two- to three-year stints in Aaronsburg, Boalsburg, and downtown State College, the two eventually constructed a modern-style home in Gray’s Woods. The house’s concrete floors and generous use of glass and steel evoke an industrial, urban-loft feel while offering lavish views of the woods and hills Jamie fell in love with more than a decade ago.
The Bestwicks were involved in the local Coaches vs. Cancer and Second Mile charities before deciding to start one on their own.
“I never knew where the money went,” Jamie says of other charities he’s been involved with. “So I wanted to see these things in action. I always had this idea of bringing the biking community together.”
Last year, the couple started the Bestwick Foundation Bike for Life event aimed at fighting cancer that featured a 62-mile “Metric Century” road ride hosted at Tussey Mountain.
On the event’s Web page, Jamie says, “This cause is close to my heart: I lost both sets of grandparents to cancer in England, and I’ve seen friends locally in State College suffer through cancer treatments. My life has been strongly shaped by cancer and I’ve had enough. Through my foundation I aim to raise money for families receiving cancer treatment in the Centre Region.”
Stormy weather on the original October 22 date forced a rescheduling of the event, but that didn’t dampen Jamie’s spirits or the turnout. Seventy-two riders participated in the grueling Metric Century, including Jamie himself.
“I’m telling you, that course, it beat me up — and I’m physically fit. I could see the finish line and my legs started cramping,” he recalls. “I said, ‘Please, I need to get to the finish line — I need to finish this race!”
The event ultimately raised $18,000 to fight cancer. “For the first year, I think we did great,” Jamie says. “I mean, how were we supposed to know that State College was about to get its first-ever hurricane roll through? Just the crazy, inclement weather that came through that weekend freaked a lot of people out. We moved it to a better date, the sun came out, had a great time, and raised some money for charities.
“For me, it was important that I followed through and made the bike ride happen. One of the best things that came out of that day was I got to meet a lot of fantastic people. We want it to be an annual event, so we’re going to do it again next year.”
The foundation also hosted a children’s holiday party at Ye Olde College Diner for 10 needy area families. The families, identified through Centre Volunteers in Medicine, were treated to dinner, a visit with Santa, and presents for the children and baskets for the families. Like Bike for Life, Bestwick hopes the holiday party will become an annual tradition.
“This community’s been so good to both me and my family,” Jamie says. “We’re just trying to give back. It may be miniscule in the grand scheme of things, but every little bit helps.”

Curtis Chan is coordinator of college relations for the College of Engineering at Penn State. He also is an adjunct instructor in the College of Communications, and graphics advisor for The Daily Collegian.