Becoming a Foster Carer: Training

Thanks for coming back to the St Christopher's blog. We're excited that you want to find out more about fostering young people. This time we'll be taking a look at the training and support you'll receive that will prepare you for fostering.

St Christopher's provides all our foster carers with great introductory training so that you feel confident that you can provide the best possible care for young people. Your introduction to fostering is made up of four parts:

• The Skills to Foster course
• Induction programme
• The foster carer's manual
• Ongoing training and development

Fostering is a challenging but rewarding career

Skills to Foster is a course that you'll be invited to attend following your successful enquiry. It's based on information from the Fostering Network and is a great way for you to learn exactly what fostering means and how important it is as an option for young people who can't stay with their families.

Skills to Foster covers three days and includes sessions on what foster carers do, understanding children in foster care, and how you can care for children safely.

You'll also find out about social workers and other professionals who'll support you in caring for young people and you'll even meet some of our existing foster carers. We encourage your family and friends to also attend the Skills to Foster course as we know they'll play an important role in your fostering journey.

As a potential foster carer, you'll also be invited to our induction days. These sessions are really useful as you'll learn about St Christopher's and our work with children and young people. This includes fostering, of course, but you'll also find out about our other wide-ranging services for young people and families.

The foster carer's manual is given to all our foster carers and you'll be given a copy once you're approved. It contains all the information and policies, which you can refer to whenever you need them. It's a handy tool that you can also use with your own supervising social worker.

As well as all this fostering preparation, we pride ourselves on our ongoing training and development opportunities for our foster carers. Your supervising social worker will always be on hand for advice and support and you'll have lots of chances to meet other foster carers at St Christopher's as well. There's lots of training sessions covering topics like safeguarding, equality and diversity, first aid, and attachment (an important psychological theory we use a lot).

Fostering is a challenging and rewarding career and we want to help you support young people to recognise and achieve their potential. Everybody has skills and experience that can help them be great foster carers, including you, and we'll help you every step of the way.

If you want to change young people's lives, why not start your fostering journey today. Find out more and enquire about fostering by clicking here.

Becoming a Foster Carer: Part 1

Becoming a foster carer for young people is a hugely rewarding career. So that you can help young people reach their full potential, prospective foster carers have to be approved by going through an application process. This process is the same for all fostering agencies, whether they're independent or a local authority. It takes up to 6 months to be approved but it means you're completely ready to start supporting young people.

Start your fostering journey today

Over the next few weeks, we'll be guiding you through the application process and giving you more information about what to expect. We know from listening to you that you can find the application process daunting, especially if you don't know much about it. That's why we're here to help.

There are four main stages to the process of becoming a foster carer:

1. Training
2. Assessment
3. Panel
4. Approval

Training

As a potential foster carer, you'll be invited to take part in courses to prepare you and help you learn about fostering young people. The courses are really helpful and give you a realistic view on what fostering involves and the different children you could be caring for.

Assessment

The assessment stage includes the checks that must be carried out by your social worker. These are required by law and help us ensure our foster carers can provide the best possible care for children and young people.

Panel

Our fostering panel is made up of childcare experts and people independent of St Christopher's. A report about your assessment will be discussed and you'll be invited to join the discussion. The fostering panel will recommend whether to approve someone as a foster carer.

Approval

The panel's recommendation will be given to St Christopher's agency decision maker. This person will confirm your approval and you'll be added to our register of foster carers, ready to start supporting young people.

Over the next few posts, we'll go into more detail about what you can expect at each stage. Next time, we'll take a look at the training stage and some of the things you'll learn about fostering.

If you're still thinking about fostering young people and want to know more, enquire on our website by clicking here.