May 2008—This month marks the 20th annual celebration of the National Foster Care Month campaign. Connect for Kids spoke with two experts to get the latest on foster care and child well-being, and emerging trends we should all know about, including the Kinship Caregiver Support Act currently in Congress. Find out what’s new, what’s working, and how you can make a difference no matter how much time you’ve got to give.

Jump to a section:

>> Q&A with Candice Douglass, communications director of Casey Family Programs and chairperson of National Foster Care Month, puts new foster care data in context and offers her view on trends to watch.

>> Q&A with Celeste Bodner, executive director of FosterClub, on the Kinship Caregiver Support Act in Congress, policies to watch, and Permanency Pacts for teens.

>> Learn More and Get Involved - even if you've only got a few minutes, you can make a difference for children.

Candice Douglass

Candice Doulgass is the communications director of Casey Family Programs and chairperson of National Foster Care Month.

Q: What’s the goal of National Foster Care Month?

The goal is really to raise awareness about the issue and to make people realize that no matter how much time they have to give, they can do something positive to change the lifetime of a child in care.

Q: It seems, from looking at data from Kids Count and other sources that there has not been a tremendous amount of progress on well-being indicators in Child Welfare in the past decade. Can you give us some context—where do we stand in terms of the numbers of children in the child welfare system and their well-being?

Defining progress really depends on what numbers you’re looking at. In the latest data [from the federal Adoption and Foster Care Analysis and Reporting System (AFCARS)], we’re seeing numbers go down, more attention paid to families and to keeping them together, and more up-front prevention work to help families before a child needs to be removed.

In 2005, there were 513,000 children in the child welfare system on any given day; that number dropped to 510,000 in 2006—so that’s a slight decrease in the number of kids coming into care. Casey Family Programs is focused on this through our 2020 strategy vision to safely reduce the number of kids who come into foster care by 50 percent by 2020.

There is a trend across the country to look at how we bring kids into care, and whether there are things we can do to reduce the need for foster care—for example, offering services up-front with families to decrease risks, to benefit family and help keep the family intact and keep children with the family unit.

Q: What about kinship care—formal or informal situations where relatives step in to take care of children whose parents can’t care for them—has there been a greater focus on kinship care in states?

There is growing focus on moving a child who is in the system into a permanent connection as soon as possible. That can mean any of a range of options. As you’re probably aware, most kids who enter the system end up being reunified with families. When that’s not possible, next best thing is to keep them with relatives, so yes, there’s been an increase in kinship care and a big movement to recognize kinship care.

I’m a CASA [Court Appointed Special Advocate] volunteer and one thing they stress is that if these youth can’t be reunited with their biological parents, you need to find a living relative whom they may be able to go to. When you do that, it helps them stay united with family, keeps them culturally intact and tends to have them stabilized in schools.

There is a bill in Congress right now, the Kinship Caregiver Support Act, to increase supports for kinship families because this care is often under radar, which means relative caregivers are not officially foster parents and so may not receive financial aid. We’ve got a lot of grandparents just barely making do as they raise grandchildren, and this movement is working to make sure those families are getting what they need.

Of course when none of those options are available—reunification or kinship care—then you look at adoption first and then fostering, which is the last step.

For older youth who are placed in care later in life, many don’t really want to be adopted—but they still require a permanent connection to caring adults. Foster Club has developed “Permanency Pacts." That’s new and innovative approach that provides some stability for older youth. (More on these pacts in our companion Q&A below.)

Q: Speaking of older youth, what do we need to know about young people who “age out" of care when they reach 18 or 21?

Every year about 20,000 youth will age out of foster care.

We’re seeing several states raise the age when young people age out [and are no longer eligible for foster care funds or services] from age 18 to 21, and in some cases even older than 21. That means these children and teens are eligible to stay in care and can also get Medicaid benefits. That’s a positive thing.

Q: What are some other trends in foster care that we should know about? (Subheadings added by CFK.)

Reducing Overrepresentation of Children of Color: Children of color are overrepresented in the system even though research shows their parents are no more likely to abuse or neglect them than white families.

There has been some tremendous work done in the state of Texas and other states looking at disproportionality—that’s the term we use. In Texas, for example, they actually created a piece of legislation that requires the state to have a disproportionality officer in the child welfare division of their agency.The state of Washington also recently passed legislation indicating that they needed to look at this issue. Michigan and Kentucky are also looking into it—so there’s a real movement to look at why are so many kids of color in the system.

A 2007 Government Accountability Office (GAO) report, African American Children in Foster Care, looked at this issue and made recommendations.

[The report in part that “Major factors affecting children’s entry into foster care included African American families’ higher rates of poverty, families’ difficulties in accessing support services so that they can provide a safe home for vulnerable children and prevent their removal, and racial bias and cultural misunderstanding among child welfare decision makers."]

Involving Fathers: Another interesting trend I’ve run across is getting fathers involved, which sounds really strange, but a lot of times they may not know that their child was taken into care because they’re not living at home. Some may be afraid to get involved because of legal issues or child support.

There was a pretty small study done by the University of North Carolina Greensboro that showed when fathers are involved and asked to sign the case plan, children stay in care about half as long. The Men’s Forum, an organization in North Carolina, has seen reductions in the number and rate of children removed from birth families, decreases in the length of stay in the foster care system, increases in the number and rate of children reunified with families, and a reduction in racial and ethnic disparities.

So they’re focusing on creating a non-threatening environment to engage men in the process to shorten time children’s in care.

Mental Health and Development: For most children, their involvement in the system is traumatic and so there is a lot of concern about mental health and well-being. Casey Family Programs is doing some research on mental health and looking at how kids in the system fare and the kind of care they get. We’re in the data-gathering stage now.

Q: What are some key challenges facing the foster care system?

In addition to the challenges we talked about (above), funding is always a challenge. Some states, like California, have been cutting funding for foster care services.

Finding foster and adoptive families is also a challenge. So is finding people to be CASA volunteers—that’s a very important job, and if you’re a strong advocate on behalf of the children you can have an impact on how long they stay in the system.

>> back to top

Celeste Bodner

Celeste Bodner is the executive director of FosterClub, the national network for young people in foster care. She gave Connect for Kids an update on the Kinship Caregiver Act some other policies and programs to watch.

Q: Can you tell our readers about the status of the Kinship Care Giver Support Act in Congress?

The Kinship Caregiver Support Act would provide federal assistance to relatives who offer a permanent family through legal guardianship to children so they don't have to stay in foster care. It would let states use federal funding to support relatives—such as grandparents, aunts and uncles—who become legal guardians of children they’ve been caring for as foster parents. More than 15,000 children could leave the system today through guardianships.

The Kinship Caregiver Support Act has gained bipartisan momentum; the House version of the Bill (HR. 2188) has 74 Representative Co-Sponsors, and the Senate version (S. 661) has 30. Over 400 child welfare organizations across the country have signed on to a letter of support for the legislation. An extra push from those who care about this issue could move this legislation forward very soon.

I encourage individuals and organizations to contact their Members of Congress in support of the Kinship Caregivers Act. An easy way to do that is through a Web contact at www.kidsarewaiting.org/act.

Q: Any other state or federal policy trends we should be watching? And how can people stay updated on policies, if they're interested?

I am optimistic about the legislative landscape focusing on permanence for young people in foster care. Several pieces of legislation have been introduced. There have been numerous hearings on Capitol Hill focused on the issue.

In addition to the Kinship Caregivers Support Act, we see promising legislation in The Adoption Equality Act, The Tribal Foster Care and Adoption Act, and a comprehensive Bill introduced by Representative McDermott (D-WA 7th) called the Invest in Kids Act.

It's really important for the child welfare community to make calls and write letters to their Congressional Members, that's the pressure that's needed to gain attention for foster care issues in this political climate. If people want to stay connected to these issues, I would encourage them to join the e-mail lists at www.fosterclub.org and www.kidsarewaiting.org.

I'm also very excited about how effective youth engagement in legislative efforts has been. On a national level, FosterClub has been working with the Kids Are Waiting campaign to leverage the voice and stories of young people to build the will to move important legislation. The young people have been hugely successful. And through their efforts, they are gaining insight about the importance of civic engagement and an understanding of federal policy and how it impacts the lives of children in the system.

On the state level, we've seen how effective state youth boards and young advocates. In California, for example, the California Youth Connection is a powerful child welfare advocacy group and their effectiveness has ensured that youth voice is always at the table when decisions are made that will impact the system.

Q: Can you tell us a little about the Permanency Pacts that Foster Club has created for older teens who may not want to be adopted but who need a stable situation? It sounds like an innovative approach.

The Permanency Pact is free tool designed to encourage lifelong, kin-like connections between a young person and a supportive adult. Essentially, it lists 45 suggested supports that an adult might lend to a young person as they transition from foster care and into adulthood.

The Permanency Pact provides a construct for an adult and youth to discuss the scope of their relationship. Young people in foster care often experience many transient relationships with adults. It can be tough to discern who's caring for you because it's their job and who will continue to care beyond the end of your foster care placement or case.

Most of us learn who to depend on based on relationships built over a lifetime; there are those people you would go to in a medical emergency, perhaps others you would ask if you need financial assistance. But youth in foster care often don't have life-long relationships and, as their age of emancipation looms, they don't have the luxury of time to establish the subtle understandings that are developed in long-term relationships. The Permanency Pact is intended to help spur a conversation that will uncover the direction of the relationship, to verbalize and substantiate the intention of both the supportive adult and the youth.

You can download the Permanency Pact for free at www.fosterclub.org.

Learn More

Connect for Kids’ Child Safety and Neglect topic pages have original articles about the key issues facing kids in care, and what’s working across the country, as well as links to research, organizations and ways to get involved.

You’ll find these and other great links on those pages:

• National Foster Care Month
• Casey Family Programs (the main sponsor National Foster Care Month)
• Voices for America's Children
• The Child Welfare League of America

Get Involved

Whether you’ve got a few minutes, hours or a lifetime to share, you can make a difference for children in foster care. The National Foster Care Month site has a great menu of options to make a difference, arranged by time commitment.

If you do get involved, let us know by emailing weekly@connectforkids.org.

###