(WXYZ) — There are more than 100,000 foster children across America who are waiting for a forever family.
The movie "Sound of Hope" tells the true story from Texas where 22 families adopted all 77 foster children in their small town.
Now, a local foundation is leading that same mission in every public school in Detroit, beginning this year with Mumford High School.
Nicole Brabson, a high school teacher at Mumford, and her husband, adopted a little child who we will identify as Brittany.
"What's it been like so far?" I asked.
"Busy! We go, but we're learning so much and I can't even describe what it feels like to have someone call you mom," Brabson said.
The adoption is thanks in large part to a new program called the Village at Mumford. It's led by a foster care advocate Saba Gebrai of the Park West Foundation.
"If each school and basically the surrounding community, which would involve the church community as well, we are going to keep our kids, they will graduate from the same schools, they’ll become productive adults," Gebrai said.
She launched the Village at Mumford to show how great the need is for foster parents.
"She said, 'do you know how many foster kids are at your school? I was like, no I only know of one," Brabson said.
Saba explained there are many who go unnoticed in the halls and classrooms.
"She invited my husband and I to watch this movie, so we had movie night with the school and a whole bunch of other people," Brabson said.
After the movie, Nicole heard stories from faces she had seen many times before.
"There were young people there speaking about their journey and a lot of them had come through Mumford, and I was like, I didn't know," she said.
Nicole had tried to adopt one child from Mumford who had languished in the foster care system for nearly a decade.
"That's a long time to be in foster care, like nobody adopted you. And she would say things like, 'nobody wanted me,' and that bothered me," Brabson said.
That adoption did not work out, but the Village at Mumford created a new opportunity and Nicole and her husband, who had gone through all of the classes and training, were ready with open hearts and minds.
"It was creating a network of us so that if our kids had to leave, or if our kids had to be placed some place else, that one of us were legally ready to take them in," Brabson said.
"What would your message be to someone else who is on the fence?" I asked.
"All you need is the heart and the time, and that's it. A little bit of time to love," she said.
Thanks to the Park West Foundation and the Village at Mumford, a student who was going to be transferred to a residential placement more than an hour away is remaining in the neighborhood and will graduate from Mumford High School.
