Care Communities

Care Communities Introduction

Nationally, 50% of foster families quit either after their first year or after their first placement, primarily because they did not feel supported. The Care Communities model has been proven to retain up to 95% of those foster parents.
Care Communities are teams of 6-8 people that wrap around a foster family with the purpose of supporting them. Members choose which role they want to play in the care community.

Roles in a Care Community

• Family Helper: Serves the family in tangible ways including meals, house cleaning, laundry, errands, yard work,etc.
• Child Mentor: This role is more involved with the life of the child. Child Mentors will provide childcare at least twice a month. Childcare is the area where foster parents need the most support and tend to receive the least.
• Team Leader: This role allows for organization of the team as well as you getting to be very involved with the foster family. Generally, tasks will require a time investment of less than an hour per week. Responsibilities include a weekly phone call to the foster family, and a weekly email updating the team on needs of the foster family. The team leader can also serve as a family helper or child mentor.
• Interim Caregiver: This role provides overnight care for the foster family when needed

This project has a very minimal cost. The majority of the cost to do the care communities is administrative costs like printing of materials and time that it takes us to do the trainings.