Foster carers

casp1997

Morning we have been looking in to fostering we have had the social worker out and checked our home been to a open meeting We have got all our training dates for july I need a bit of chat to other foster cares if possible thanks

libbyc3

no problem - ask away!
your probably still about 6 - 9 months away from being approved, its a slow arduous process!

puddy

is this with a local authority or an agency?

casp1997

Its a a gency and they have said it will take 5 to 6 months we have put a aplication form in a traing is begging of july

casp1997

puddy wrote: »

is this with a local authority or an agency?

Agency why whats the difference

CH27

I'd love to Foster but we haven't got the room.
Good luck.

casp1997

CH27 wrote: »

I'd love to Foster but we haven't got the room.
Good luck.

I carnt wait to do it now i work in a secondry school so i no what they are like well i have one 14 year old my self

libbyc3

we've been fostering 5 years - I have to say, working with young people is completely different from living with the effects of the damage that some young people will arrive at your house with. be prepared for the unexpected!
one bit of advice i would give - no matter how keen you are, never take a placement of a child within 3 years of age difference of your own child. fostering will affect your teenager there is no getting away from it, but if he/she is not in actual competiton with the looked after child you are in a better position to work through it.
(if my own kids were on here they would be giving the same advice but in capital letters!)

puddy

casp1997 wrote: »

Agency why whats the difference

depends on the agency and what sort of children they specialise in (if any), but if they take general childen and are not specifically for children with disabilities or respite, then children placed with agencies are harder to place because of challenging behaviour, special needs, age, histories.

agencies tend to be referred a lot of teenagers and hard to place children because local authorities will always try first to place in house, its cheaper for them, a LA foster carer will not receive the amount per week you will if you become a carer with your agency,, so if they cant place in house, it means that the carers on their books have turned down the placement for various reasons. there are times of course when there is no match or they need to be placed out of area but there is a tendancy for apparently 'easier' placements to be placed in house (i say apparently as until you live with a child you never know what has gone on in their past and what their real needs are)

im obviously talking generally, i have worked in both and assess for both and young children with low level need sometimes do get placed in agency placements but im talking about the overall picture. the assessment criteria and process is no different, but you may need to think about and be very clear about the level of need that you feel you can cope with and the types of referrals the agency recieve.

puddy

libbyc3 wrote: »

we've been fostering 5 years - I have to say, working with young people is completely different from living with the effects of the damage that some young people will arrive at your house with. be prepared for the unexpected!
one bit of advice i would give - no matter how keen you are, never take a placement of a child within 3 years of age difference of your own child. fostering will affect your teenager there is no getting away from it, but if he/she is not in actual competiton with the looked after child you are in a better position to work through it.
(if my own kids were on here they would be giving the same advice but in capital letters!)

quite right, and lots of preparation needs to be done with the birth child as they dont have the emotional capacity yet to deal with what may come. hopefuly OP will have specified under 11s as her child is 14.

2 of the agencies I assess for would not accept her on that basis as they dont get enough referrals for that age group in general