This CHOP nurse and foster mom has won $100,000 to help foster kids who are separated from their siblings

By the age of 9, Samii Emdur had already figured out the big things she wanted to do with her life. She learned most of them from her own family.

“From the time I was born we basically had an open-door policy for anybody who was in need,” said Emdur. “I grew up knowing that if you were able to open up your home, you should.”

That’s what her parents did. In her earliest years, her dad had a metal factory in Camden. He’d hire people who needed a second chance, and the family gave them a place to live in their South Jersey home if they didn’t have one themselves.

Samii Emdur decided she would one day do that for kids in need — by becoming a foster parent.

And did she ever. At 26, Emdur took in her first foster child. She was already working at Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia as a nurse (something else she had decided, at a young age, would be in her future). Now, eight years later, Emdur, 34, has fostered a dozen children, and even adopted one of them: daughter Jordan — “my everything” — a super-inquisitive, chatty little girl who will turn 3 on Feb. 9.

But that’s not all. Two years ago, Emdur — so close to her own three brothers and troubled by the loss of connection she saw between siblings in foster care — started Camp To Belong River Valley to help reunite separated brothers and sisters.

In 2019, the camp brought together 20 siblings for a week at Camp Conrad Weiser, South Mountain YMCA, in Berks County. In addition, about 45 children took part in events throughout the year. And in 2020, despite the limits imposed by COVID-19, 50 brothers and sisters were able to reconnect virtually.

And she will soon get to do much more. Emdur, who now works in oncology at CHOP, has been awarded a $100,000 grant from the Pilot Pen company to support her camp’s work on behalf of New Jersey and Pennsylvania’s foster children.

“Through the G2 Overachievers Grant, Pilot Pen recognizes and celebrates those who go above and beyond their nine-to-five role to make the world a better place,” said Ariann Langsam, Pilot Pen vice president of marketing, in a statement. “Along with being a full-time nurse and mom, Samii’s deeply committed to making a positive impact on the foster-care community. She’s the perfect example of the Overachiever spirit.”

Emdur plans to use the money to strengthen her young nonprofit and, in doing so, increase the number of children it can serve. She’s hoping, pandemic permitting, an in-person weekend camp will be possible this fall in New Jersey. If not, she’s looking into Zoom and other virtual activities or one-day camp events like those held in 2019.

Last year, when COVID-19 required a pivot to a Plan B, Emdur created and distributed packages to foster families that offered activities to help support foster-sibling relationships. For example, each child received 12 cards so they could write and send notes to their siblings every month. And one night, they held a symbolic campout: They were told that, even though they were not physically together, they were looking up at the same stars.

Still, at the heart of Emdur’s nonprofit is the sleepover camp where foster children reunite with siblings who, in some cases, they hadn’t spent time with in years.

“The quarantine we have been dealing with for almost a year is [difficult] on a much greater scale for foster children because they’re quarantined away from their siblings,” she said. At camp, “We’re creating a place they can forget about being a child in foster care, forget about their therapies or court dates, and just have fun and build up sibling relationships.”

“I think it’s easy to take for granted the ability to share moments with our siblings or just play board games,” said Emdur. “But our campers do not take those moments for granted. They cherish them.”

Miranda Conley, 18, said that the week she got to spend at Camp To Belong River Valley with her younger brothers, Eithan and Joey, was “the most amazing experience I ever had.”

That week in 2019 brought her closer to her siblings, she said, and helped close the gaps between other brothers and sisters, too.

“Around the campfire, people would get up and talk about it,” said Conley, who lives in Atlantic County. “You’d cry. You’d hear the brokenness in these kids’ hearts.”

The experience meant so much to her, Conley said, that she took Emdur aside that week and offered to be a counselor when the camp is held again.

Joseph Longo, 43, a social worker, is the adoptive father of Conley’s brothers, now 14 and 16. The week at camp did much to restore the siblings’ relationship, he said.

“They hadn’t spent an overnight with their sister in many, many years,” said Longo, of Salem County. “Normally, it was two hours for a barbeque or something like that. But to actually bond for a full week, that was amazing. It just gave them a chance to reconnect and see what it was like to be a family again.”

Just as the bond of family has been so important in Emdur’s life, she has tried to help bring it to others. Growing up, her brothers had medical needs, and she was there for them, even driving home from college to administer one of her brother’s injections for an autoimmune disorder. She herself has several autoimmune conditions that flared up in her early adulthood, making her so gravely ill that she had to relearn to walk. During that time, it was hard for her parents to understand why she remained so passionate about continuing to foster children, she said, but they supported her nonetheless.

So now, when a new foster child comes into her home, Emdur said, she tries to build a relationship with the child’s whole family. Her goal is “to support them however I can,” and, if possible, to help bring them back together. But her special mission is the siblings, about 75% of whom get separated from each other when they enter foster care.

Just as Emdur welcomed guests in need at her family’s home when she was a child, her daughter, Jordan, is doing the same with the children Emdur fosters. Sometimes, said Emdur, Jordan gets quite attached to their houseguests.

“A lot of people can’t understand why I put Jordan through that,” Emdur said. “But I think I she is growing up knowing that this is her permanent home, she is never leaving, and I am always her mommy. We are also a safe place for children when their mommy and daddy are not healthy. For the duration that we foster, this is what she’ll know.”

Jordan is also learning what Emdur herself learned as a child: “You always have something to give to others” — and that, in time, your efforts may bring change.

“I want the day to come that our program does not need to exist,” Emdur said. “That means that I’ve done my job advocating that siblings shouldn’t be separated.”

For more information about Camp To Belong River Valley, visit its website www.ctbrivervalley.org.