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Child welfare best serves children placed in care by serving their families. No matter what circumstances these children's families find themselves in, they are their families forever. Even when separated from their families because of abuse or neglect, children remain emotionally attached to their parents. They think about them, worry about how they are doing, and fear that they may never be together again. If they do not see or hear from their parents, they fantasize about them.

Children's feelings about who they are, or can be, are affected by the messages they hear from others about their families. If they believe their parents are bad people, they may feel they are bad as well. Family-focused services are best practice because, no matter what the outcome of a child's placement in foster care, their birth family is their family forever. Neighborhood-based, family-focused, and child--centered services minimize the trauma that children experience when separated from their families. At the same time, these services ensure safety for the children and increase the probability that they will be reunified with their families.

Foster families who understand how important birth families are to the children in their care will encourage and support the continuing contact between parents and children. That contact is essential if reunification is to be successful.

Frequent visits between children and their birth families minimize feelings of loss and reduce acting-out behaviors in the foster home. Foster parents who are nonjudgmental and able to emphasize birth parents' strengths, while acknowledging challenges to be overcome, send positive messages to children about their parents. This helps children feel good about themselves, while being realistic about the reasons they are separated from their families. Family-focused foster care helps children feel less conflicted about their feelings toward their foster family and their birth family. The trauma of separation is minimized.

Understanding how important birth families are to the children in their care enables foster parents not only to provide loving homes to children who must be temporarily separated from their birth families, but also to reach out and support birth parents by mentoring and co-parenting with them. Foster parents encourage birth parents, model positive parenting skills, and support birth parents in continued parenting by involving them in the care of their child. When appropriate, foster families may even become an ongoing support system for birth families and may remain an important part of the birth family, even after reunification.

To ensure timely permanence for children, and to increase the probability of reunification, birth families, foster families, and social workers must come together as the "Family Team" to define problems, overcome obstacles, strategize solutions, and set goals. Working together, the Family Team can overcome obstacles, return children to their parents, and develop healthy support systems that will help maintain birth families in the future.

Family Team meetings begin as early as possible after placement and continue throughout the child's stay in foster care. These meetings help build productive relationships, clarify roles, and keep all team members on task. Each is empowered by sharing equally in the effort. The social worker (team leader) encourages and supports the other team members to participate fully. All team members feel respected for their contribution and celebrate together the family's reunification.

Source: "Family Forever, Reunification Through Family-Focused Foster Care, A Discussion Guide. Prince George's County Department of Social Services in collaboration with the Child Welfare League of America. CWLA Press. Washington, DC.

10/11/02