Thomas earned a bachelor’s degree in mechanical engineering in 2001 and a master’s degree in industrial technology manufacturing in 2004 from North Carolina A&T State University.

According to statistics, of the 800,000 children and youth who have experienced foster care system each year, only 2.7 percent of them, between the ages of 25 and 34, end up earning a bachelor’s degree.

Thomas, on the other hand, beat the odds. He worked as a mechanical engineer at Northrop Grumman Corporation, a patent examiner at the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office and as a senior mechanical engineer at Alion. He is currently a law student at Wayne State University and a few months away from taking the bar exam.

But it is his conviction to fight for the well-being of children in the foster care system that keeps him going.
“All a kid wants is to be loved by a parent, any parent, and to be treated as a normal child,” said the Detroit native.

Thomas is the Michigan chapter president of the Foster Care Alumni of America Association and serves on the Michigan Supreme Court Foster Care Review Board.

At six years old he encountered his first bout with the system. For eight years he and his eight siblings went from group homes to foster homes—never living in the same place at the same time. At times he would live with one or two of his siblings and the groups would switch and exchange almost as frequently as his address. By the age of 15, he entered an independent living program and was homeless by 16. Thomas was taken in by a neighborhood afterschool program worker and soon began to flourish.

The saving grace for Thomas was community members who cared, he remembers.

“I had mentors. There was a community of folks that surrounded me,” he said thankfully.

His return to Detroit was influenced by that same support. After being accepted into the law program, Thomas was compelled to lend his hands to the resurgence and rebuilding of the city.

“Detroit is in strong need of young vibrant sons and daughters of the city,” he said. “I have nieces and nephews who needed someone to look up to, that’s why I came back.”

Thomas’s rise out of the foster care system to become an accomplished engineer, promising attorney and civic leader is a success story. But his goal is to make sure that he is not the only one. Today, he added, there are thousands of children in the foster care system that will come across positive experiences but there are even more that may become homeless, get involved in criminal activity or never graduate from school.

“I want people to care about one another, especially for a child, who at no fault of his own was placed in those circumstances. I’m an advocate when it comes to that,” Thomas said.

By: Courtney J. Jackson