My name is Scott Hanson, and I’m the Co-founder and Co-CEO of Allworth Financial.
My wife Valerie and I were married in 1992 and had two children; a girl and a boy. After a lot of late-night discussions, we determined then that two kids were right for us and decided not to have any more. Like many of you, we raised both of our children to the best of our abilities, while also happily looking forward to the day when they would leave home and begin their own lives. (A moment that, in hindsight, arrived sooner than expected.)
In the fall of 2016, our youngest child left for college and we finally reached the point where we were empty nesters. We enjoyed our walks before dinner, quiet evenings together, and weekends to ourselves.
Then something happened that forever changed our lives.
We were presented with the opportunity to provide a forever family to two foster children: sisters, ages nine and six.
These two young girls had been removed from their biological parents and had been in the foster system for just over a year. But, like so many children, the foster family they were placed with was no longer able to provide for them, so they found themselves awaiting placement with a new family who could care for them and meet their needs.
The substantial requirements for the support of displaced children was not something entirely new to our family. For the past three decades, I have invested a considerable amount of time and resources in organizations that work with disadvantaged children. Valerie had become acquainted with these two sisters through her volunteer service as a Court Appointed Special Advocate (CASA), where she worked to ensure that the girls were safe, that they were enrolled in school, and that they had the support they needed to hopefully make their way.
And although Valerie and I were grateful that we were able to make a difference in children’s lives, at that point in time, we’d never seriously discussed bringing a child into our home. Yet, when we learned about their plight, something stirred within us.
Unfortunately, from our years of work and volunteering, we knew all too well the dire statistics facing these children. The reality was, that the chance of these two little girls being placed into a home together was minuscule. To Valerie and me, allowing them to be separated was just not an option.
So, in November of 2016, we made the decision to bring them into our home and raise them as our own. Happily, their adoption was made official in January of 2018, and both are now Hanson children, and, thankfully, will be so forever more.
But all across the country, the odds are still very much stacked against the more than 400,000 kids who are currently navigating the foster care system. Which is why I am happy to announce that we are launching Allworth Kids - a program designed to help foster children throughout the country - by partnering with the Ticket to Dream Foundation.
The entire Allworth Financial team is thrilled about this partnership and the opportunities ahead to contribute to such an important cause. In Allworth Kids, we all very much look forward to building a national philanthropic entity that provides foster children with the support they need to reach their full potential and to make a smooth transition into adulthood.
- Scott Hanson
Founder & Co-CEO, Allworth Financial