All sorts of people become foster carers. This is important as we live in diverse communities and we need our foster families to reflect this difference and our multi-cultural heritage. Foster Carers may be single, living with a partner, have their own children or not, and have an interest and enjoy working with young people. They will need to have patience with challenging behaviour and an understanding of the needs of young people going through adolescence who have the added difficulty of disrupted family situations. A commitment to valuing and respecting young people is essential.
A qualified Foster Care Social Worker will be asked to meet and discuss your ability to meet the needs of vulnerable young people. This will involve asking you personal questions about your own childhood, your past and current relationships and your family lifestyle. This will enable both you and the worker to assess your skills and abilities in continuing to meet your own family's needs in addition to those of the young person placed. The work you do together will be based on trust, confidentiality and respect. Foster Carers often talk about being clearer about their strengths and what they have to offer young people at the end of this process.
Foster carers will receive a foster carer fee for each young person they look after. In recognition of the complexity of this work the fee is equivalent to a Residential Worker's salary. This fee is paid when the young person is in placement and Foster Carers continue to receive a fee when on respite for up to 28 days. A retainer fee, which is the equivalent to half the foster carer fee, can be paid between placements for up to 28 days per year. Foster Carers need to be available to provide emergency and planned respite whilst receiving retainer fees. In addition, Foster Carers will receive a generous maintenance allowance to enable them to meet the needs of the young person placed i.e. food, clothing, holidays, activities, celebrations, etc.
Foster Carers can apply to as many agencies as they like. However, following initial enquiries with our own service carers would need to notify their agency in writing of their intention to apply and be assessed with our agency. This enables relevant agencies to plan for the future needs of any young people currently placed with you and your existing agency. Foster Carers once approved at our Fostering Panel would provide placements for our agency and would be de-registered with their previous agency. It is unlikely Foster Carers will provide placements for different agencies at the same time.
Yes. However, the young people placed have a right to a smoke free environment and a responsible approach includes discouraging them from smoking. This includes not smoking in front of young people and supporting them not to smoke themselves. We cannot place young people with health or respiratory problems with you if you smoke.
All applicants undergo a general medical to determine if they are fit to foster. All applicants are treated equally and only conditions that would detrimentally impact on your ability to meet the needs of any young people placed or conditions that would be worsened by becoming a foster carer would exclude you from becoming a foster carer.
Currently, Scottish legislation precludes people from same sex households fostering. This includes heterosexual people. When this is changed we would welcome applications from gay or lesbian couples or individuals. You will go through exactly the same process as any other applicant.
The young people placed will be between 12 and 18 years. Taking into account the 'natural parenting age' for young people. We would seek to place them with foster carers who were at least 21 years and no more than around 40 years older than themselves. Therefore, the age range is between 21 and 58 years for foster carers dependent on the age of the young person placed.
All Foster Carers undergo an enhanced Disclosure Scotland check. We need to know of all previous criminal convictions and these should be acknowledged at an early stage in the process of becoming a foster carer. There are some serious convictions that would prevent us from placing young people with you. However, do not assume your situation excludes you from consideration without having discussed this with us first.
Contact with birth family is very important to most of our young people. This could be indirect contact i.e. letters and cards or direct contact i.e. involvement in planning meetings about the young person's progress, supervised or unsupervised meetings and home visits including overnight stays. Foster Carers often fulfil an important role in supporting young people to have the most positive contact they can with their families.