Photos by Sam Dean The Roanoke Times

Virginia Tech tailback Darren Evans signs a poster for Shaun Plogger, 4, and his father, William Plogger, of Glasgow on Wednesday night at TAP's fatherhood program. Evans spoke about his experiences as a young father.

After feeding his grandson Zimyre Black some cake, Stafford Rosser gives him a hug and a kiss while attending TAP's fatherhood program Wednesday night in Roanoke. The event was geared toward fathers and father figures.

Darren Evans was nervous. He glanced at the dozens of parents sitting in the room, and his palms began to sweat. But he thought about his girlfriend and his young son. He cleared his throat and spoke.

"I take joy every night in going home to my son, putting him to sleep, waking up in the morning and having him tell me he loves me," Evans said. "It touches your heart. Children that age don't know what they're doing, but they're doing it."

Evans, the 20-year-old tailback who was most valuable player in Virginia Tech's Orange Bowl win in January, spoke Wednesday night in Northwest Roanoke with a group of fathers organized by a nonprofit community action agency.

After he became a father at age 18, and his college football career skyrocketed only when his girlfriend and son moved to Blacksburg with him, Evans became the type of triumph-of-the-human-spirit story that sports columnists write about.

But Wednesday night, he was simultaneously another father and a shot in the arm at Total Action Against Poverty's Head Start ongoing fatherhood program. He was among parents in an initiative to keep fathers in the lives of their children.

"We want to let fathers know that no matter where you are, be a daddy for your children," said Pam Ellington-Armah, TAP's supervisor of family services.

Among the parents at the event in the Lincoln Terrace Apartments community room was Freeman Burks, a 30-year-old father of two girls: Shyana, 7, and Shykayla, 3.

He said he wants to be part of his daughters' lives because his father was absent from his own. During father time with the Boy Scouts when he was growing up, he would be paired with his best friend and his best friend's father.

"I come to these functions to help me be a better father figure in their lives," said Burks, of Northeast Roanoke. "My mother had to raise me and my brother and sister by herself, so I want to be there for my kids."

TAP's fatherhood activities, to help Burks and parents like him, is part of a broader program that helps low-income families set and achieve goals to be economically stable and have a healthy marriage by helping people prepare and find jobs.

The fatherhood program for about 800 children costs about $50,000 per year, including staff salaries, according to TAP. It's difficult to quantify in decimals and dollars the benefits of this program. But a Maryland-based nonprofit published a study in 2008 that said the federal government spends more than $99.8 billion per year supporting father-absent homes.

According to "The One Hundred Billion Dollar Man," published by the National Fatherhood Initiative, the number of children living in single-mother families went from 8 percent in 1960 to 23.3 percent in 2006.

"I think our study shows that it might be cost-effective to support father presence through government programs, and that it might be worth piloting some programs to see if anything works," Christopher Einolf, an author in the study and a professor in DePaul University's School of Public Service said via e-mail.

Back at the chat with parents, Evans said, "My motivation is my son." He works during the summers to support his son, James, and girlfriend, Taneesha. He was seriously homesick during his redshirt season in 2007, but blossomed when James and Taneesha moved to Blacksburg from Indianapolis.

After he spoke, he said he wasn't nervous anymore. It was the first time he had spoken to a group about being a father, and said he'd had good role models himself -- his own father, who went to all of his high school games, and his late grandfather, who after long days of driving a truck would play with him and his cousins.

"I came here because it would make my grandfather proud," Evans said. "I always had a male role model in my life. How could you leave your own son out to dry? The child didn't ask to be brought into the world. It wouldn't be fair not to be there for him."