Kunes Car Convo: Riding Along with Misty Smith of Illinois DCFS

There is something about a convertible and a sunny afternoon that gets people talking. That is the idea behind Car Convo, the series where host Corey Cole invites local women who are quietly shaping our community to slide into a 2026 Chevrolet Corvette, let their hair blow in the wind, and share the story behind the work they do.

 

For the very first ride, Corey sat down with Misty Smith, a Public Service Administrator with the Illinois Department of Children and Family Services. Misty laughed about being the "first victim" of the series, and while she admitted to a few nerves, what followed was an honest, funny, and genuinely moving conversation about family, resilience, and the ordinary moments that add up to an extraordinary impact.

Ask Misty how she found social work and she will tell you she did not choose it. It chose her.
She originally set out to become a forensic psychologist who profiled serial killers. Life had other plans. Misty became a mother at 17 and left high school, and she speaks openly about that chapter because she knows how easily it could have defined her. She decided it would not.

 

"That was my driving factor," she said. "I did not want to be a statistic."
She went back to college as a single mom, first with one child and then with two, searching for a path that paired work she loved with a career that could support her family. Social work fit. Straight out of school she connected with a private agency and became a foster care worker, and she has been doing some version of that work ever since.

 

Misty is quick to credit the people and programs that helped her get there. Her support came mostly from friends, the motivation of her children, encouraging teachers, and later her co-workers. She also leaned on the same systems she now helps families navigate, including SNAP and a medical card that she still qualified for even after earning her degree. Understanding those systems from the inside is part of what makes her so effective today.

Misty was candid about one of the reasons she hesitated to say yes to the interview. DCFS does not always carry a positive image, and she knows why. The hard stories are the ones that reach the headlines.

 

Her point was not to dismiss those stories, but to widen the picture. When most people hear DCFS, she explained, they think about child removal. That is only one piece. The agency is the Department of Children and Family Services, and much of its work centers on child protection, family preservation, and family reunification. There are programs for families facing situations like eviction, and people can reach out for help before a case is ever opened.

 

"We have resources for that," she said, describing families who simply call and ask if anything can be done. Making sure people know those resources exist is a mission in itself.

Over 14 years, Misty has worked nearly every role in the field. She spent five years as a foster care case manager, took on intact family cases, moved into investigations, and now supervises an intact team, a role she has held for five years. About two-thirds of her career has been spent preserving or reunifying families, and she would argue all of it has, because reunification was always the goal.

 

One case from early in her career still anchors her. She was working with parents whose children had been removed, and those parents were doing everything asked of them, not just checking boxes but making real progress and eager to grow. The trouble was the children had been placed in a foster home that was not supportive, which made an already hard road even harder.

 

Misty could have stepped back and let the process run its course. Instead she advocated. She pushed to have the children moved to a different foster home, something that was difficult to accomplish, and the new foster parent turned out to be wonderfully collaborative, working directly with the birth parents. The children returned home fairly quickly and thrived.

 

"I knew what was best for those kids," she said. "So that is what I advocated for."

When Corey asked what drives her, Misty did not hesitate for long. She is passionate about investing in other people.

 

"I would not be where I am today if somebody had not invested in me," she said.

 

Her own path was not a straight line. It took her ten years to finish her bachelor's degree. She started a master's program and left it, went back and earned one, and is now nearly finished with her third. These days she has a granddaughter who just turned two, and she describes that as a different kind of love, the kind where you get to pour into someone and then hand them back.

That belief in investing in people led Misty to Big Brothers Big Sisters, where she reached out to Sarah Baka and was matched with her "little." This August marks nearly three years together, and Misty has loved watching her flourish into a teen.

 

For anyone wondering whether mentoring is out of reach, Misty offered reassurance. The process is thorough, as it should be when children are involved. It starts with an online application, followed by a call from Sarah, an interview that feels a bit like a job interview, an FBI background check, and an online training that helps set the pace for the relationship. What surprises most people is the flexibility. Some months she sees her little every week, and other months it is a single Saturday outing, all depending on schedules.

 

Anyone interested can fill out the application online, connect with Sarah at one of the local recruiting events, or reach out to Misty directly and she will help point them in the right direction.

Part of Misty's work involves supporting survivors of domestic violence, connecting families with services and, just as importantly, sitting with people and waiting for them to be ready without judgment. She noted that it can take a survivor many attempts before they are able to leave, and even then fear often lingers. Having someone walk beside them and help them navigate systems that were never taught in school can make all the difference.

 

She speaks about this with the perspective of someone who has lived it. Among the transformations she has witnessed, she counts her own. That compassion, earned the hard way, is exactly what she brings to every family she meets.

What makes Misty remarkable is not that she sees herself as a hero. She does not. She talks instead about ordinary instances that create an extraordinary impact, and about all the people who have made that kind of impact on her.

 

That is exactly the spirit Car Convo set out to celebrate. Kunes is proud to spotlight the local women whose steady, everyday work makes our community stronger, and Misty Smith is a fitting place to start.