Melbourne Beach Officially Recognizes WAYS for Life During Foster Care Awareness Month

When a community puts something in writing, it means something.

In May 2026, the Town of Melbourne Beach did exactly that. Town leaders issued an official proclamation designating May as Foster Care Awareness Month and formally recognizing WAYS for Life for providing wraparound support services to youth aging out of foster care in Brevard County.

The proclamation was made possible through the advocacy of Susie Stark, a longtime Melbourne Beach resident, retired Brevard Public Schools teacher, and co-founder of Shining Through Shadows. Susie brought this recognition before the Town and championed the cause of young people who are too often overlooked once they leave the foster care system.

Shining Through Shadows is a Melbourne Beach-based nonprofit dedicated to providing scholarships and educational resources to students who have faced significant obstacles on their path forward. Their work, like ours, is rooted in the belief that resilience deserves support, not just admiration.

For the young people WAYS for Life serves, aging out of foster care can mean aging out of every support system at once. No guaranteed housing. No financial safety net. No built-in next step. Our wraparound services exist to fill those gaps, so that the transition into adulthood is not a cliff, but a bridge.

This proclamation is a reminder that when a community decides its youngest and most vulnerable members matter, and then says so out loud, something shifts. We are grateful to the Town of Melbourne Beach and to Susie and the Shining Through Shadows family for making sure those young people were seen this month.

Read the full proclamation below.

To learn more about the work WAYS for Life does every day in Brevard County, visit WAYSforLife.org.