We are filmmakers on a mission to elevate Davon and Tavon Woods in causing systemic change in the foster care system.
Davon and Tavon Woods: The twin brothers currently have 38 more states to walk in before they make history, and they can’t do this alone. They are on the walk of their life that they say is a true labor of love. The brothers hope that each step will help children who they believe are being left behind by a broken foster care system. Davon and Tavon Woods know better than most because they were born into the system 27 years ago. “Listen guys it’s not easy but we gotta get it done. My foot hurts but you see on my shirt...foster kids matter,” the brothers said. Both are going the extra mile -- literally -- to raise money and spread awareness for kids in foster care. “We experienced so much hurt, so much pain, so that’s kind of why we’re doin’ what we’re doin,", Davon said. The twins are now on a mission to walk at least 20 miles in all 50 states.
Disclaimer/Trigger Warning: The following story contains details of child abuse that may be upsetting to some.
From Davon:
“Our biological mother, Patricia, was using drugs while she was pregnant with us. To be more specific, she was doing crack cocaine. The whole time she was pregnant with us, she never visited the hospital. In fact, she didn’t even know she was pregnant with twins. When she finally went into labor, I (Davon) came out first. Afterwards, when they were getting ready to close her up, they discovered another baby stuck under her rib cage (it was my brother Tavon). They said we were so small we could’ve fit in a shoe box, weighing only about 2lbs each. We also came back positive for crack, so we were considered ‘crack babies.’ Immediately, DSS got involved and they took us out of the hospital. Our other family members fought to get us, but in the end none of them were able to.
We were placed into foster care and at the age of two, we got adopted by the Woods family. My biological name was originally Daquane Shamar Jacobs and my brother’s name was Tavon Lamar Jacobs. Once we got adopted by the Woods family, they changed our names to Davon Sammie Woods and Tavon Sammie Woods. Growing up was very hard because we didn’t know anything about the family we were staying with, we didn’t know anything about ourselves, and we didn’t know anything about our biological family. We had so many questions, but all were left unanswered. We felt like we were just a paycheck in our parent’s eyes. They never told us they loved us, we got beaten for small issues, and we were never given a voice. They would yell at us for no reason, and we often endured a lot of verbal abuse.
I tried to commit suicide multiple times; I didn’t want to live anymore because of how we were being treated, but the only reason I didn’t was because of my brother. I didn’t want him to be alone. We started smoking and drinking around the age of 11. We were dealing with so much at a young age and we were afraid to tell people what was going on. We were afraid of our parents and what they would do. I remember nights on my knees praying to God, asking him why he had to put us through what we were going through. We didn’t do too well in school. We were barely making it because we were too worried about everything but school.
We found our biological family when we were 17 years old in Sumter, SC at the shopping mall. We were on the way back from Columbia, SC and Tavon said, ‘Let’s stop at the mall in Sumter.’ I was like, ‘No, I don’t want to go there,’ but we ended up going anyway. As we were leaving Rue 21, this guy approached us and said, ‘Y’all look like my cousin’ and in our head we were like ‘everyone says that.’ then we told him our biological last name and he was like, ‘Y’all are my cousins and we have been looking for y’all for years.’ That’s when he started calling all of our family members and connecting us with everyone.
Soon enough, we started sneaking and going to see our biological family. We would tell our adopted parents we were going to do something else. But when we met our biological family, it was very emotional and it felt weird because we never knew anything about them. When we finally met them, it was very different from anything we imagined. For example, our biological mother didn’t really show the affection we expected. Once we graduated high school, we went to school for modeling and acting. We did that for a few years and then we got introduced to the street life. We started selling drugs at the age of 18-19, and that’s when our life started to change tremendously. We were still hurting and dealing with issues from our past, so we thought smoking, drinking, running the streets, having sex, etc. would allow us to forget about the pain. We always wanted to do something positive in life, but our past had us messed up so bad and we didn’t know what love was. For this reason, it was so hard to love others.
Davon Woods & Tavon Woods:
In 2016, our little brother got shot and killed. He was only 17 years old. When that happened, it changed our lives forever. Me and my brother moved around a lot in life and eventually settled on moving to Georgia; we wanted to start a new journey. But when we moved to Georgia, it seemed like our life got even crazier. We started hanging with guys that were associated with gangs. Me and my brother watched people get shot right in front of us. There were times we got guns drawn on us and we could’ve lost our lives. It seemed like every day something bad was happening and that’s when we decided to seek a major change. I knew if we kept living the way we were, we wouldn’t be here today.
One day, our brother-in-law and sister came to see us and asked us if we wanted to go to church. We were just about to go smoke and weren’t going to go, but we went anyway. That’s when we started going regularly and we gave our life to God. He transformed our whole life around. We always wanted to do right in life, but we never had any directions. When we came in contact with God, he gave us direction. Our goal is now to fight for every child in the foster care system and be able to give them the opportunity to be kids; we just want the world to know what we had to go through and what every child has to experience in this foster care system.
My brother and I had an opportunity to work at a group home called AMIkids and since that very first day there, the kids were attached to us because they had staff that could relate to them. My brother and I would spend so much time with those kids. They were always so excited to see us coming to work; we understood those kids. We worked there for a year, and we impacted so many kids lives, but the owner and the director didn’t like what we were doing. There were a lot of issues taking place there so we would call the state and AMIkids’ headquarters because of how the kids were being treated, but those call and emails didn’t help. Even after countless numbers of complaints, nothing ever happened. They wouldn’t allow the kids to go off campus, they wouldn’t allow the kids to spend their own money, they wouldn’t allow the kids to do a lot of things. Those kids were screaming for help but help never came.
One day, my brother and I came to work, and we weren’t scheduled to work at that time. They told us we had to leave because they had us working the night shift after, even we had already told them we couldn’t work night shifts. We realized they were doing all they could to have a reason to fire us. When they told us to leave the facility, we didn’t. We told them we would stay until our scheduled time because we wanted to spend time with the kids. That’s when they told us if we didn’t leave the facility they would call the police on us, so we finally left, and they suspended us for a week. Next thing we knew, they fired us. Those kids were broken once we left. Now, a lot of our kids that were trying to change their lives are locked up or on drugs really badly, without a positive mentor. Most of them aren’t doing anything with their life.
ABOUT THE DIRECTOR/PRODUCER:
My name is Amanda (Kazzy) Cryer. I am grateful and humbled to be leading this project. I am a Filmmaker, Social Impact Influencer, Consultant and Strategist. I am committed to elevating voices through film and media and am passionate about media-driven projects that bring awareness to social issues. Having lived and worked in both developed and developing countries, I have been active in co-creating opportunities to solve problems, shift systems, and activate the inner capacity of leaders to create lasting change. I see Davon and Tavon Woods as leaders, change makers and catalysts in causing real systemic change in the foster care system.
As a filmmaker, my productions have included What They Wanted, What They Got, which sold to Showtime; and the multiple award winning, Luz: The Flower of Evil. From 2009 to 2012, I worked with a cohort of Native American actors, including alumni of the Twilight film series, to bring awareness to the water infrastructure issues negatively impacting Indigenous communities across the country and produced several PSA videos to educate policy makers and stakeholders in government about the situation. I also worked at Roy Lee’s production company Vertigo Entertainment (Doctor Sleep, It, The Departed, The Lego Movie) and served as a producer on the award-winning short film The Lord of Catan starring Fran Kranz (The Cabin in The Woods, Mass) and Amy Acker (Person of Interest, Angel).
I co-founded BIG Change Makers and 1 Voice World, education and media production companies involved in the development and co-creation of media driven projects that look at what’s possible when we overcome polarization and division and move towards unity for humanity - recognizing our interconnectedness and interdependence. One of my latest films - Inside Men - highlights personal stories from people whom the prison system has affected in one way or another, and private industries that view prisons as a solution to their bottom lines and societal challenges. Kate Boccia, President of the National Incarceration Association (NIA); Yusef Salaam (member of the exonerated Five - The Central Park Five) and Kit Cummings, author of The New Convict Code and founder of the Power of Peace Project (POPP) are featured prominently in the film.
As a social impact consultant and strategist, I have coached, mentored and worked with hundreds of people from diverse backgrounds including influencers, leading change makers and emerging changemakers in media, celebrities, community activists, leaders at the United Nations, scientists, philosophers, thought-leaders, TV and Film personalities, Nobel Prize recipients, CEOs, actors, and founders of nonprofits and triple bottom line organizations. Since 2009, I have been practicing the Conscious Full Spectrum Response framework developed by my mentor Dr. Monica Sharma (former Director of Leadership and Capacity Development at the United Nations) in systems shift language and transformative dialogue in media. The CFSR is a unique response model that has generated sustainable results worldwide.
I was the Project Director for United Global Shift, a nonprofit that delivers workshops for people engaged in initiatives that make a difference. UGS coaches people on projects that both empower individuals and shift the systems that perpetuate chronic issues such as poverty, discrimination, environmental degradation and war. I coached emerging leaders in project management and strategic planning that addressed systemic issues.
As filmmakers and media professionals, we know the power film has in creating and co-creating movements and bringing a heightened awareness to what is actually happening. We are on a mission to create a movement. We would be incredibly honored if you would join us on this journey and contribute to creating this movement with us - together - as a community.
We are very active on social media and as a collective, are influencers on Tik Tok, LinkedIn, Facebook and Instagram. We are happy to elevate you, in supporting us in this mission - on all of our social media accounts. It is going to take all of us to make a real change in the foster care system. We can't do this alone. We hope you'll join us in creating this movement.
Cinematographer:
Ken Jackson is a 2020 graduate from Clemson University's Graphic Communication department with an emphasis in Media Production. After graduation, Ken moved to Atlanta where he co-founded Firelite Studios, a Media Production Company. His true loves are Directing and Cinematography. In his down time, Ken enjoys watching old, obscure films and supporting colleagues with their film projects.
Production Support:
Tony Brown and Rob Polon
Makeup Artist:
Brianna Knight
WHERE THE MONEY GOES:
In order for us to make this short film happen, we will need to raise a minimum of $15,000 USD. As the Director/Producer, I am not paying myself. If we raise more than $15,000, that will give me the ability to pay myself as well - which would be nice. However, not necessary to make this film happen.
The entirety of the $15,000 will go towards paying for locations, film and audio equipment, recreation scenes, our cinematographer, our editor, our audio professional, graphics in the editing process, research, and submissions to film festivals.
We want YOU to be involved in this film. If you don't see a perk you want, suggest one to us and if we can make it work - we'll add it for YOU to have.
If we don't raise the entire $15,000, we will start shooting this film. However, the closer we get to that $15,000 goal, the better resources we will have and the ability to access those resources will be much easier for us.
RISKS AND CHALLENGES:
There are always risks and challenges with making films and contributing money to films. Films are risky investments. We may face obstacles such as not being able to secure distribution for the film. However, we are committed to getting this film out to the world and will be submitting it to every major film festival it qualifies for. We will also be submitting it to Universities, NGOs and the United Nations, to bring awareness to the Foster Care System.
OTHER WAYS TO SUPPORT US:
And by the way, if you can't donate money to our project, that's OK. It would mean the world to us - and will help us tremendously - if you would share it with your social networks. Indiegogo has great share tools for this!
Thank you so much for all of your support and for coming aboard this journey with us!
