Social workers play an important role in the process of fostering children, but their jobs do not stop once children are placed in foster care. They serve crucial purposes, such as ensuring foster homes are safe, and they also work with local adoption agencies to find permanent homes for foster children among a variety of other things. Understanding more about the role of a social worker through the fostering process and beyond can help you decide whether this is a career path you’d like to pursue. In this article, we explore what foster care is and how social workers positively impact the lives of children within this system.
What is foster care?
Foster care is a broad term that describes a system of care for children who’ve been removed from their parents for safety reasons or who otherwise cannot live with their birth parents. It includes children placed in institutions, group homes or the homes of certified caregivers, also known as foster parents. Foster care is a government-funded program, so foster parents and other institutions receive compensation for taking care of the children.
Foster home and care licensing requirements differ from state to state, and each state has its own Department of Child Protective Services to oversee licensing. Individual social workers, who’ve undergone special training through formal education or an online social work graduate degree work closely with each fostered child. Spalding University’s master’s course prepares students for a number of social service roles and aims to promote social justice.
How do social workers support foster children?
A social worker’s responsibilities and duties to foster children can be summed up into five categories. These are:
Helping foster parents gain licensing
Social workers act as intermediaries between government agencies and foster families. They guide them through the fostering process to help children find suitable placements. This includes helping families become licensed and dealing with references.
Training foster parents
The licensing process involves training for the foster parents, which social workers are heavily involved in. They may communicate the perspectives of the child’s parents, in addition to their own. Training includes many sessions that prepare families for foster care.
Completing administrative tasks
Social workers have a lot of paperwork to complete. They carry out tasks such as home studies and create detailed reports on foster families to be filed. It’s important for them to document everything that may affect the child’s safety so the family can maintain their license.
Post-placement support
Social workers typically keep in contact with foster families to provide ongoing training and resources. They also check in regularly with foster children to see how they’re developing. If the agency holds the foster family’s license, which depends on the state, the social worker is much more involved.
Working with fostered children
Social workers have a duty to foster children primarily, as everything they do centers on the child’s welfare and future. They work closely with foster children to understand and help realize their goals and needs. They also look for permanent homes for children and attend meetings with biological parents to determine whether children can return to their care.
