Advocate Spotlight
CASA DuPage is Pleased to Introduce you to
Susan Hill
One of our Extraordinary Advocates
Susan Hill has been a CASA DuPage advocate for 3 years. Nearly a year before she retired, she was traveling throughout the country teaching a business development class. During her class in Boston, she spoke about passion and asked the class members to share what they were passionate about in their lives. One gentleman spoke up and talked of his passion for CASA. Susan was very interested and continued the conversation with him after the class. Returning home, Susan reached out to CASA in her community (CASA DuPage) and applied to join the next training class.
Susan wanted to advocate for an infant, so when the opportunity came up, she was excited to get started. Advocating for an infant has many challenges. Susan interacted more extensively with the baby’s natural mother and foster parents to gather the information she needed to report to the judge. The baby had 3 different foster homes and she found herself not only advocating for the baby, but in large part also helping the natural mother to obtain the services and support she needed to have her child returned home. Susan helped guide her to community programs and resources she needed to refocus her life as well as better care for her children. Susan became a sounding board to this mom and was often just there to listen and help her navigate situations, making decisions that resulted in positive outcomes. After 2 years, the baby was returned home.
In one of her two current cases, Susan has two school-aged children she’s helping to enroll in extra-curricular programs that fit their interests and talents. With older children she’s learned to bring an activity to engage them. This gives her the opportunity to observe and talk with them while they are doing something fun. She’s applied her engineering background to bring science experiments and kits to keep it fun during visits. She also found the children are more likely to open up to her if they are focused on a project.
Susan states, “I always hope I’ve had a positive influence on a child’s life. Not only that, but the parents and foster parents’ lives.” She added, “Working with these families has also changed my life. They’ve given me a different perspective and I’ve learned things are not always so black and white. The families have helped me and changed me in so many positive ways.”
Susan lives in Naperville with her husband and has 4 grown children of her own. She also has 3 grandchildren that she loves spending time with. In her retirement, she says the three most important things are her family, her volunteer work and traveling.
Thank you Susan, for being one of our extraordinary advocates!
