May is National Foster Care Month.
What does that mean? Why does it exist?
It isn’t a celebration of foster care. Foster care occurs when families do not have the supports they need to safely keep children in their homes, so that’s not something for which we should break out the party hats.
What is National Foster Care Month all about?
National Foster Care Month is a time to bring the conversation of foster care
Dear Ms. 6,
You arrived in a storm.
It’s okay, I whispered, sliding under the kitchen table next to you. I’m scared of storms, too.
I didn’t sleep the first night week month ever again, slipping into your room to make sure you’re still there. “If you get sick, or scared, or hurt,” I reminded you endlessly, “you just come into my room and wake me up, or call my name, and
She was only supposed to stay for the weekend.
I told myself the reason we were only taking short-term foster care placements was to protect the hearts of the children already in our home.
And if we used the term “foster friends” instead of “brother” or “sister,” nothing would get confusing. Right?
But perhaps I was trying to protect my heart as well. Although–how deeply could you fall in love in one week?
It was
You’ve submitted the Foster Care Inquiry Form. You’ve completed the Application. You’ve had a Physical Standards Inspection of your home and passed. You submitted your Autobiography and now, you’ve scheduled your first Foster Parent Interview.
Your heart beats a little bit faster. What is going to happen? What if you say the wrong thing? Is there a wrong thing?
Foster care interviews are a little awkward at first. It is hard to open your
Why JRI Foster Care?
According to our most recent foster family surveys, foster parents choose to work with JRI Foster Care because of the support they receive from our team and our agency. If you’ve never done foster care, it might be hard to know what you would need in terms of support and what to look for in an agency. Well, wonder no more! Here are the supports JRI Foster Care provides and why
What if there was one more bed?
One more bed for a 14 year old would mean that Kayla could step down from a group care program where she’s completed her service plan. She has skills to manage her anxiety and a care team to support her. She could live with a family while her biological family regains its footing. She could feel a bit more like a regular kid.
One more bed for a
The goodbye was a hard one. As soon as the kids learned that they were going to live with their relatives, behaviors that had long since stopped began cropping up again. The cuddly children who once snuggled in for stories and movies, who danced in the living room to music, who were joyful turned angry and closed off. Hurtful words were flung about, tantrums were common, and fists were even raised at Mama T. “You’re
This month, JRI Foster Care is hosting a book drive. To be perfectly honest, we have no end date for this and hope to keep our book list ever-growing, but we’ve decided that now is the time to start this movement.
Why books? With all of the moving parts of foster care, all of the challenges facing children and youth in care, what good is a book going to do? It is a fair questions
As 2020 winds down, we all know that it has been a tumultuous year. But despite the difficulties we have faced, I know there are people we can call, day or night, when a child is in trouble.
They are the caretakers who open their homes when the courts order a child removed from their home for their own protection — perhaps because a parent or guardian has been arrested for drugs or violence
“I’m her seventeenth.”
Foster mom’s voice was full of emotion. My eyes widened, my skin prickled. “Seventeenth? Home?”
“Yes, she’s seven, her sister is four, and I’m their seventeenth.”
A is seven years old and has lived in seventeen homes. D is four years old and has lived in nearly as many. For the seven year old, that means a new home roughly every four months. For the four year old, that means a new
Do you have a question about JRI services?
Rachel has been a part of the JRI team since January, 2000. For over 20 years, Rachel has been working in the field of human services assisting families with accessing and navigating services. Rachel received her Bachelors degree in psychology and Masters Degree in Public Administration from Bridgewater State University. She was promoted in July 2005 to Family Networks Program Director where she closely worked with the Department of Children Families for 10 years ensuring that children and families received the highest quality of individualized services ranging from community based through residential care. Rachel is very dedicated to helping the individuals she works with and is committed to improving the lives of children and families. Rachel’s passion for creative service programming inspires her in her role as JRI Service Navigator.
