Family Care Associates

Foster Care (Familes@FamilyCare)

Foster care, also known as family placement, is looking after someone else's children in your own home at a time when his or her family are unable to do so. The reasons can be many and varied for example, parent(s) being ill, family breakdown, child considered to be at risk of harm and relationship problems. Foster Carer(s) are there to:

Provide a safe, secure and stable environment to children and young people.
Where appropriate to work with the young person, their family and the professionals involved to help children return home as quickly as is safely possible. The work may well include taking the young person to visit their family or friends and providing information to significant family members as to how their child/relative is doing. In other words keeping them well informed and involved as is reasonably practicable.
Make every effort, with others, to ensure that the young person achieves their maximum potential in terms of health, education, life skills and having as enjoyable a childhood as is possible given their individual circumstances.

Fostering isn't Adoption. Adoption is a legal process that in many cases ends the rights of the natural family in respect of that young person. Foster Carers in the main are working to return the young person to their natural family or to be involved in making arrangements for permanency for that young person - this may include adoption but can be long term fostering or perhaps working towards young people living independently.

Who Can Become a Foster Carer?

It is a little difficult to define the qualities of a carer but the following is a helpful guideline. You will normally:

Be aged twenty five to sixty years of age
Be single or with a partner
Have experience of looking after children whether they be your own or other peoples
Have the support of your partner or family in your desire to be a foster carer
Be confident in yourself in the sense of dealing with professionals involved in the care of the young person
Be prepared to consider giving up your day job if you have one. You will receive a fostering fee and a Boarding Out Allowance when you have a child or young person living with you
Being a car driver would be helpful, but not essential

We welcome applications from people regardless of colour, sexual orientation, religious persuasion or disability.

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How do I become a Carer?

Please don't think that this is a simple or unchallenging process. Because foster carers look after other people's children there is a very careful and detailed assessment for you to go through. For those people that want to be a foster carer this can be a frustrating process because it never happens as fast they would like.

First thing you need to do!
The first thing you need to do is contact us and we will arrange for one of our social workers to give you a call back and take some details from you. Alternatively you can fill in our Initial Enquiry Form, email it to us and we will get back to you - usually within one working day - click here to open form.

Secondly
We will arrange for one of our social workers to visit you for an informal chat. He/she will discuss with you what fostering is, the ups and downs, the application process and the sort of questions that you will be asked. For example:

They'll explain to you the need for us to undertake 'police' checks on you and any other adults who live in your home or who may be frequent visitors to your home.
The need for health checks to be made.
The need for references to be taken up and the fact that we will need to talk to your referees face to face.

They will also explain to you the support that you will receive from us to help you in what is a very challenging career.

This informal meeting is also the opportunity for you to ask us questions. We always suggest that you start a question list well in advance of the meeting and add to that list as questions come to you.

If you want to proceed we'll then arrange a series of visits to you, which is the start of the application process

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Application/Assessment Process

The process involves a number of activities, many of which go on in parallel in terms of time scales.

If we have a number of people who have expressed an interest in becoming a foster carer we will invite you to a meeting to go into more detail as to what foster care is about and the likely demands that will be made of you and indeed your family, in other words, we won't hold anything back. It's important that if you are going to proceed that you go into it with your 'eyes wide open' because it can be a very demanding and challenging experience. The personal rewards can be great but there will be times when …. - well that is why we have these meetings.

Our Social Worker will arrange a series of meetings with you (normally between six and nine). These meetings have a number of purposes to them:

For us to get to know you so that if your application is successful we have a good understanding of you and your circumstances so that we can 'match' a child or young person to you.
For us to collate information about you and your family. There is a detailed application form that we have to complete that is presented to our Fostering Panel who recommend that you be 'approved' or 'not approved' as a carer.
For us to complete forms necessary to get medical reports on yourself. You don't need to be in perfect health to be a carer but we do need to be clear as to any health complications that you may have. As much as we take great care in looking after and acting in the best interests of the young people that we care for, we must and do, look after your interests hence this information is crucial.
For us to complete forms necessary to get police checks made on you and any other adults who lives in your house or who visits regularly. The purpose of this is simply to assure ourselves that no adult has an offence that would suggest they should not be looking after another persons child.
For you to continue to ask us questions, perhaps as the role of a foster carer becomes clearer to you, or perhaps you become more aware as to the implications that looking after someone else's child can have for you, your family and friends.
Running parallel to this process you will be enrolled in our training programme which is delivered by Family Care Associates personnel to help develop your understanding of looked after children and the fostering task.

Finally all these reports are sent to our Fostering Panel who consider all the information very carefully. They will meet you, and your partner if you have one and the Panel will recommend whether or not your application is approved.

That recommendation is then submitted to a 'decision maker' who is the Group Business Manager of Family Care Associates. He/she considers the recommendation of the panel and any concerns that they may have highlighted. He/she will then write to you with the final decision.

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Fostering Panel

Fostering agencies are required by law to establish Fostering Panels. Essentially the role of the panel is to consider applications to become a carer. Furthermore the role is to annually review carers to see how they are doing.

To enable the Panel to do this there are a number of members all of whom are experienced in their own rite, whether they have a legal, medical or social work background. Some members of the Panel will also have been/or are a carer and others may have been 'in care' as a young person. Some members of the Panel are employees of Family Care Associates, whilst the other members are independent of Family Care Associates.

In establishing the Panel and reviewing its membership Family Care Associates endeavours to work to the membership of the Panel reflecting the cultural diversity of the community the Panel serves.

In summary the purpose of the Panel is:

To consider applications to foster and make recommendations about the suitability of applicants. This also includes making recommendations about the number, age range and backgrounds of the children/young people that may be placed with carer(s).
To review the continued suitability of carers. All foster carers must be reviewed at least every 12 months. The families@familycare Fostering Panel will also review when there is a significant change in a foster carer's circumstance, or where a serious complaint or allegation is made against a carer.

Decisions about approval, refusal, or alteration/termination of approval of foster carers is made by an 'Agency Decision Maker', who is the Group Business Manager for Family Care Associates, following consideration of panel recommendations.

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Types of Placement Offered (Family Placement)

There are a number of types of placement offered:

Short Term
Usually from two or three days up to three months.

Medium Term
Three months to six months.

Long Term
Six months to - well can be years (permanence). For older children they can be with carers up to their eighteenth birthday or sometimes longer where it is appropriate to their needs and the local authority continues to take financial responsibility for them.

Emergency Admissions
Normally the same day a referral is made.

We place great emphasis on planning placements and giving the young person and the carer the opportunity to meet in advance of the placement going ahead. It is a fact that the better the planning process with planned introductions, then the more successful the placement is likely to be for all concerned.

Sadly there are circumstances where time cannot be given to such planning!

Single placements
There are children and young people whose needs are such that they should not be placed with another 'looked after child'. Hence the phrase single placements.

Sibling or multiple placements
A foster carer may be asked to take more than one child where for example:

Brother and sister are best placed together

A second unrelated child can be placed with a carer. Normally the children placed will not have or display significant challenging behaviours. A second child will not be placed where this is judged contrary to the best interests of the child already living with the carer.

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What Support Will I Receive?

We all need support. Looking after someone else's child comes with great responsibilities and commitment and at times the going can be hard going and stressful. There can be many downs - equally there can be many highs and many would agree that it can be the most rewarding work going.

Family Care Associates/families@familycare endeavour to ensure quality support to carer(s).

Core Groups

We run a Core Group System for all our children and young people. In summary this is a group of key professionals, carers, family (if possible), and the young person themselves. The purpose of the regular and frequent meetings is to ensure effective communication by all involved and to check that everyone is doing what they have agreed to previously. The group also has a role in problem solving and helping out when someone gets stuck.

Social Work Support (families@familycare)

Each carer(s) has a designated social worker who will meet with them regularly. Carer(s) are expected to make themselves available for supervision where a range of issues are discussed relevant to the care of the young person. Training needs of the carer will also be regularly discussed.

Family Placement Support Worker

Each carer(s) has a designated Family Placement Support Worker who will meet with them frequently. Their role is very much a 'hands on' supportive role and they are there to give advice and support.

Out of Office Hours Support

Where a carer requires advice or support out of hours, various contact numbers are available to them so that advice and support can be given all year round, 24 hours a day, seven days a week. Those contact numbers will include the Family Placement Support Worker, the Social Worker, the Registered Manager and Senior Managers within the Company

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Training

Carer(s) are expected to make themselves available for training sessions. Examples of training given are:

Child Protection
Life Story Work
Food Hygiene
Health and Safety
Child Development and Attachment
Separation and Loss
Behaviour Management
Communicating with Children and Young People

In addition specialist training can and will be provided as required.

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Will I Receive a Payment?

Yes you will. families@familycare pay a fee to carer(s) whilst they have a young person placed with them in addition to an allowance to cover their care, food, heat, light, pocket money, clothing and birthday presents etc.The fee is intentionally a generous one. Whilst this is a caring role, our view is that it is also a job, in that it does involve commitment, paperwork, attendance at meetings, a commitment to training and demands tenacity when the going gets hard, as it sometimes can.

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Family Care Associates Limited is a company registered in England and Wales
Legal Status - click to view