It didn’t take 22-year-old Kylee Kidwell long to see that child abuse is a problem in the midstate — and that she wanted to do more to be part of the solution.
Kidwell has been a pediatric nurse for just one year in the intermediate care unit of the Penn State Health Milton S. Hershey Medical Center.
In that short time, “I’ve seen a lot of cases where a child had to be hospitalized due to child abuse or neglect,” said Kidwell, who grew up in Lancaster County but moved to Woodland Hills in Middletown to be closer to the med center.
“I felt like I was limited in what I could do as a nurse. I always wondered after the child left, what happened next?” she said.
The young Messiah College graduate started wondering if there wasn’t more she could do to help, to try and change a child’s outcome beyond their hospital stay.
Kidwell has found that path, as one of the newest volunteers with Dauphin County’s Court Appointed Special Advocates program, or CASA.
CASA volunteers get assigned to a particular case involving children who have gotten caught up in the Dauphin County court system.
Volunteers such as Kidwell do a deep dive on the case, getting to know the child as well as all the other people involved in the child’s situation.
The volunteers make recommendations to the county judge assigned to the case as to what kind of placement and services are in the child’s best interest. The recommendations are nonbinding and the decisions are up to the judge.
The primary role of the CASA volunteer is to be an “advocate” for the child, placing their needs and what is best for them above all else, Kidwell said.
Following an intense orientation and eight weeks of training, Kidwell and seven other women were sworn in as the newest CASA volunteers during a virtual ceremony April 28.
Kidwell and the seven others all raised their hand and took an oath administered by county President Judge John F. Cherry. The volunteers all participated remotely from their respective homes using Zoom, due to the county courthouse being closed because of the COVID-19 pandemic.
Cherry gave the oath of office remotely from his courthouse chambers. Also participating were Christine Pfau Laney, the executive director of Dauphin County CASA; and Lori Serratelli, who leads the county CASA board of directors.