foster care

This report was produced in 2002 by the Chapin Hall Center for Children, based at the University of Chicago. It provides data on patterns of employment and the levels of earnings of youths leaving foster care in the year they become eighteen. The study was concentrated on youth from Carolina and Illinois. Comparisons are made with other youths of similar age from low income families and with those who are reunited with their parents before they are eighteen.

Workbook containing standards and other materials intended to assist new foster carers to reach a certain level of competence within their first two years of fostering.

Report inquiring into the age range of the foster care workforce in the UK to try to establish whether there are any immediate concerns for the future provision of foster care.

The document provides examples of good practice in listening to the opinions and ideas of looked-after children. These examples can be used by local authorities and independent fostering providers to develop their fostering services.

This case study describes how Solihull's high unit costs for placements for children in care were reduced; increasing resources available to improve the quality of care and delivering outcomes that better met the needs of children. It sets out the steps that Solihull took to address the situation and achieve 11% savings on the placements budget. These improvements were achieved through a combination of developing the authority's foster care service, redefining the commissioning and contracting team into a professional procurement service, and improving management of the external market.

This booklet provides an overview of the key research messages from 'Quality Matters: Messages from Research' written by Mike Stein which examined the impact of the Quality Protects initiative on the quality of services for children and young people looked after by local authorities. After setting out the key messages the booklet focuses on: assessment; supporting quality care; and integrated working, training and workforce reform. A full list of the nine studies including a short description of their aims and methodology is included.

Document laying out the regulations and national minimum standards which apply to fostering services.

These regulations and standards form the basis of the new regulatory framework under the Care Standards Act 2000 for the conduct of fostering services. Includes a statement on the relationship with the UK National Standards for Foster Care produced in 1999.

These standards were developed to improve the quality of care and service for those in foster care. The standards cover the following activities: recruiting, selecting, approving, training and supporting foster carers; matching children and young people with foster carers; supporting and monitoring foster carers; and the work of agency fostering panels and other approval panels. The standards do not apply to the services provided directly by foster carers themselves.

'All in a day's work' is suitable as a summative assessment on practising social work law. This learning object will: help users to reflect on what approach, or combination of strategies, they adopt to being a social work law practitioner and will enable users to undertake an assessment of their social work law knowledge. 'All in a day's work' presents a series of tricky situations.