Armando Hernandez was just a child when he and his siblings searched their home for alcohol their mother stashed. And when they found it, they poured it down the drain and threw the bottles out.

It was the beginning of a childhood marred by his mother’s alcoholism, a father in and out of the picture, years of bouncing from one foster family to another and the weighty responsibility of caring for his younger siblings — who experienced the same disappointments he did each day.

“Mom gave us empty promises, and it was one let down after another,” he said.

Hernandez, now 20, is one of hundreds of young adults in South Dakota, and thousands across America, who have spent their teenage years in foster care, not been adopted, and have aged out of the system. Despite private local efforts as well as state and federal resources aimed at helping them transition into adulthood, without the traditional support of a family, statistics show that the odds are stacked against them.

According to the Wendy’s Wonderful Kids Program, foster children who are not adopted have poorer educational outcomes, only 61 percent are employed, 33 percent will end up homeless, and they are reported to have more mental health issues.