Raquela and Niki's Fundraising
Niki Kalisperas is Campaigns Manager and Raquela Mosquera Event's Coordinator at FosterWiki
Niki and Raquela's story
In 2023 two friends, Niki and Raquela, joined forces to become a force for change. Friends for decades, more like sisters, finding solace and acceptance in each other through their shared trauma and experiences of being in care.
They know, like you do, the shocking outcomes and the experiences for children in the care system, and know in their hearts it can not be allowed to continue.
It can no longer be acceptable that so many care leavers go on to be homeless, lost, grieving, in prison, with severe mental health issues, suicide and poverty.
Niki and Raquela consider themselves the lucky ones, they survived and now want to make sure all kids in care don’t just survive but thrive.
Raquela says
I was in a children’s home from the age of 3 months -2 years old, at 14 I was in a foster care placement i then became homeless and lived in a squat for a couple of years.I totally understand the lifelong implications of broken attachments and I know this can affect your whole life, as it has mine.I campaign for change because with all our knowledge of the importance of attachments, it is so distressing to me that children in care are still enduring these often-needless painful losses
Niki tells us
After fleeing from my troubled home and finding safety in foster care as a teenager, my life goal was to become a foster carer -I was horrified by what I witnessed, it's criminal. I want to put the 'care' back into children's care and to put love central to these children's lives, I can't bear to sit by and watch any more children suffer.
The current outlook and future for care leavers is bleak
- Feeling lost
- Finding themselves homeless
- Struggling with feelings of grief
- Suffering mental health issues
- Are at risk of suicide
- Are at risk of being groomed
- At risk of domestic abuse relationships
- Can fall into substance misuse
- Be at risk of entering the criminal justice system, youth offending units, prison
- Less chance to break away from intergenerational trauma, including poverty
Care-experienced people statistically die 20 years younger than the general population who have not experienced all of the above.
Raquela and Niki consider themselves the lucky ones, they survived difficult childhoods and now want to ensure that all children in care don’t just survive, but thrive.
It won’t surprise you that these two strong inspiring women have a plan, to bring awareness at the highest level, then, importantly, to take action, bring solutions, and forge real change.
But.... they need your help
Fundraising in Action
Check out some of the ways you can help fundraise for FosterWiki.
Redstone House Bake Sale
A heartfelt thank you to the children at Redstone House who baked lots of cakes and had a cake sale and raised a huge £230 to give back to the children in care, thank you!
A big THANK YOU from Joe Wicks
Climbing Mount Snowden
A massive thank you to the amazing team who conquered Mount Snowden in support of Noah’s Campaign!
I want to give a special shoutout to Raquela, Louisa, Leah, and Serena for their incredible effort in raising a whopping £2,216.
Thank you all so much!
With the funding, they can realise their dream of bringing meaningful change and better outcomes for looked-after children and those who care for them.
We asked them what makes them different, and they said “We know it’s good to raise awareness, but we will also be bringing meaningful achievable solutions, so many people tell us what’s wrong, but not how to fix it. We intend to do that with the extensive
knowledge bank of our care-experienced team and frontline foster carers. The money will enable us Niki and Raqulea and the FosterWiki Care Experienced Team to expose hidden truths, raise awareness to a greater level, take data, research and evidence to the government and demand change.
FosterWiki Care Experienced Advisory Group
How are they going to do it?
They will use the power of passionate people working together and the power of your donations through fundraising. Your money will make a difference to looked-after children and those who care for them, it will make a difference to future young lives.
With your help, no one will be able to turn a blind eye any longer, with your help we can make….care means care.
As one of our care-experienced young people said if not now when?
- The power of film - Written, produced and directed by young care leavers.
- The power of documentary - A new hard-hitting documentary about the truth and real issues in the foster care industry.
- Continuing Noah's Campaign - preventing broken attachments in care system already launched in Parliament.
- Promoting evidenced based research, data and statistics collected from our foster care and care experienced survey.
- Keep working with Government, local authorities, Minsters and MP's
Your generous donations will help this passionate community work together for the futures of our young people who have experienced the care system, and make a huge difference to supporting looked after children and those who care for them.
