At Flourish Fostering, our friendly, personal and inclusive approach is just how independent fostering used to be; a family feel from a community of people who all know each other by name and remember the important details about why we all do the work we do, and why we choose to do it together. We take pride in ensuring a team approach, where our staff and Foster Parents join forces to create a caring fostering community where we all work together to ensure children’s needs are met.
Through a therapeutic fostering approach, Flourish Fostering recognises that it is important for staff to nurture a warm but professional relationship with Foster Parents, creating an environment where we provide high quality, 24/7 support delivered by a strong, skilful and committed team. This includes recognising that Foster Parents become the experts in how to nurture a child or young person in a family home alongside family members and within a busy lifestyle that works for the good of everyone in the household. We have created a ‘Founders Group’ of Foster Parents to draw on that expertise to aid new foster families in one of many ways to ‘find their feet’.
Part of Our Fostering Family
When becoming a Foster Parent with Flourish Fostering, you become part of our fostering community that is supported by our ground-breaking Founders Group – this core group is a unique network of highly experienced staff and Foster Parents who have many dozens of years fostering or supporting foster families successfully, and they support one another and new foster families who join Flourish to find inventive ways of bringing improved outcomes to children who may have had limited opportunities in life so far.
The Flourish Fostering team understand that fostering is fun and incredibly rewarding; we recognise that it can also be complex and often demanding. We believe that all children deserve to live in a friendly, safe and stable home; that’s why our dedicated fostering team are committed to ensuring that our Foster Parents are trained to the highest possible standard in order to meet the needs of the children and young people placed in their care.
Training, Development and Support
As a Flourish Foster Parent, you have access to a training programme that is second to none and includes beginner, intermediate and advanced levels of therapeutic training to ensure that the golden thread of therapeutic fostering runs throughout our service, catering for families in their first year to more experienced families who have years of experience.
This commitment to training for both staff and foster families ensures that we can place a wide range of children with varying needs and define a bespoke care package just for them. We pride ourselves on our flexibility and will always go the extra mile to support a foster family or child in whatever way is needed.
As well as offering all of the mandatory training essentials Foster Parents need to meet fostering standards, our comprehensive training programme covers a fascinating and highly engaging therapeutic training that will take Foster Parents on a voyage of discovery – about themselves as well as child development. There are short courses on what lies behind challenging behaviour to understanding a multitude of aspects of child and adolescent development issues, barriers to attachment, family dynamics, and our cutting-edge flagship course in Relational Fostering which is in development right now and will be available soon. Foster Parents soon discover that their attendance at these enjoyable and eye-opening courses builds an impressive portfolio of learning that demonstrates professional learning and development.
Ongoing support includes monthly supervision with a Supervising Social Worker, monthly reflective practice groups with a peer group of Foster Parents, and regular consultations and training groups with a qualified Psychotherapist. In addition, there is Out of Hours support for when the office is closed, ensuring that advice, guidance and emergency responses are available round the clock, every day of the year.
Our Foster Parents are part of an expert and friendly team of fostering professionals who all work together to improve the quality of life of foster children. We provide ongoing training to empower our Foster Parents to develop a full range of skills and professional expertise – not only to help and support the children they look after, but also to enrich and enhance their own lives.
Specialists in Relational Trauma
As specialists in Relational Trauma, our fostering service is underpinned by our therapeutic approach, combined with our specialised therapeutic training programme that enables our Foster Parents to provide exemplary emotional care that meets the needs of children who have experienced trauma in their lives.
Children and young people who have had to leave their families of origin and be cared for by a foster family will undoubtedly be experiencing a range of big feelings such as hurt, anxiety, fear, anger and despair; they need comfort, support and direction. A warm relationship with Foster Parents who understand is central to helping these children overcome their experiences and grow into happy and successful individuals who have processed and can live with their childhood sadness without it defining who they are. Our committed and experienced team will support you and the fostered children from the very start of your journey with us.
Pay and Allowances
Flourish Fostering provides competitive pay and a full range of fostering allowances which will enable Foster Parents to fully meet the needs and expenses of foster children.
The payment you receive from us will be made up of two elements, which are calculated on a weekly basis per child in place:
- The Maintenance Allowance for the Child – this covers the costs of everything that you need to care for a child such as food, clothing, transport, personal items and household expenses.
- The Foster Parent Fee – this is the professional fee for the time and skill you have dedicated to fostering each child in your care.
We also provide our Foster Parents with 21 nights paid (professional fee) respite, and actively encourage our Foster Parents’ family members and own support network to provide the continuity of care for foster children in their Foster Parents’ home. This enables our Foster Parents exclusive recuperation time to recharge their batteries.
You will also be entitled to a range of additional payments to cover special occasions and circumstances, such as a contribution towards an annual holiday, school uniform allowances, activities during school holidays, Christmas and religious festivals and some travel costs.
Enrich Your Life
Becoming a Foster Parent with Flourish Fostering will enrich your life as you increase your understanding and your capacity to help children and young people. The rewards will be humbling as you see how your care and support enables a child to develop and thrive. Being a successful Foster Parent doesn’t end with the child who has lived as part of your family, it will make a difference to the way that child will grow to parent their own children, so you could be making a multi-generational difference to society. Flourish Fostering will be there with you every step of the way throughout this incredible journey.
If you would like to learn more, you can start your journey and find out more about what being a Foster Parent with Flourish Fostering involves.
