Foster care
Foster care is a system in which a minor has been placed into a ward, group home, or private home of a state-certified caregiver, referred to as a "foster parent", or with a family member approved by the state. The placement of a "foster child" is normally arranged through the government or a social service agency. The institution, group home, or foster parent is compensated for expenses unless with a family member. Any adult who has spent time in care can be described as a "care leaver", especially in European countries.
The state, via the family court and child protective services agency, stand in loco parentis to the minor, making all legal decisions while the foster parent is responsible for the day-to-day care of the minor.
Scholars and activists have expressed concerns about the efficacy of foster care services provided by non-government organisations. Specifically, this pertains to poor retention rates of social workers. Poor retention rates are attributed to being overworked in an emotionally draining field that offers minimal monetary compensation. The lack of professionals pursuing a degree in social work coupled with poor retention rates in the field has led to a shortage of social workers and created large caseloads for those who choose to work and stay in the field. The efficacy of caseworker retention also affects the overall ability to care for clients. Low staffing leads to data limitations that infringe on caseworkers' ability to adequately serve clients and their families.
Foster care is correlated with a range of negative outcomes compared to the general population. Children in foster care have a high rate of ill health, particularly psychiatric conditions such as anxiety, depression, and eating disorders. One third of foster children in a US study reported abuse from a foster parent or other adult in the foster home. Nearly half of foster children in the US become homeless when they reach the age of 18, and the poverty rate is three times higher among foster care alumni than in the general population.
By country
Australia
In Australia foster care was known as "boarding-out". Foster care had its early stages in South Australia in 1867 and stretched to the second half of the 19th century. It is said that the system was mostly run by women until the early 20th century. Then the control was centered in many state children's departments. "Although boarding-out was also implemented by non-government child rescue organizations, many large institutions remained. These institutions assumed an increasing importance from the late 1920s when the system went into decline." The system was re-energized in the postwar era, and in the 1970s. The system is still the main structure for "out-of-home care". The system took care of both local and foreign children. "The first adoption legislation was passed in Western Australia in 1896, but the remaining states did not act until the 1920s, introducing the beginnings of the closed adoption that reached it peak in the period 1940–1975. New baby adoption dropped dramatically from the mid-1970s, with the greater tolerance of and support for single mothers".Cambodia
Foster care in Cambodia is relatively new as an official practice within the government. However, despite a later start, the practice is currently making great strides within the country. Left with a large number of official and unofficial orphanages from the 1990s, the Cambodian government conducted several research projects in 2006 and 2008, pointing to the overuse of orphanages as a solution for caring for vulnerable children within the country. Most notably, the studies found that the percentage of children within orphanages that had parents approached 80%. At the same time, local NGOs like "Children In Families" began offering limited foster care services within the country. In the subsequent years, the Cambodian government began implementing policies that required the closure of some orphanages and the implementation of minimum standards for residential care institutions. These actions lead to an increase in the number of NGOs providing foster care placements and helped to set the course for care reform around the country. As of 2015, the Cambodian government is working with UNICEF, USAID, several governments, and many local NGOs in continuing to build the capacity for child protection and foster care within the Kingdom.Canada
Foster children in Canada are known as permanent wards. A ward is someone, in this case a child, placed under protection of a legal guardian and are the legal responsibility of the government. Census data from 2011 counted children in foster care for the first time, counting 47,885 children in care. The majority of foster children – 29,590, or about 62 per cent – were aged 14 and under. The wards remain under the care of the government until they "age out of care". All ties are severed from the government and there is no longer any legal responsibility toward the youth. This age is different depending on the province.Israel
In December 2013, the Israeli Knesset approved a bill co-drafted by the Israel National Council for the Child to regulate the rights and obligations of participants in the foster care system in Israel.Japan
The idea of foster care or taking in abandoned children actually came about around 1392–1490s in Japan. The foster care system in Japan is similar to the Orphan Trains system of the US, thinking the children would do better on farms rather than living in the "dusty city". The families would often send their children to a farm family outside the village and only keep their oldest son. The farm families served as the foster parents and they were financially rewarded for taking in the younger siblings. "It was considered an honor to be chosen as foster parents, and selection greatly depended on the family's reputation and status within the village". Around 1895 the foster care program became more like the system used in the United States because the Tokyo Metropolitan Police sent children to a hospital where they would be "settled". Problems emerged in this system, such as child abuse, so the government started phasing it out and "began increasing institutional facilities". In 1948 the Child Welfare Law was passed, increasing official oversight, and creating better conditions for the children to grow up in.United Kingdom
In the United Kingdom, foster care and adoption has always been an option, "in the sense of taking other people's children into their homes and looking after them on a permanent or temporary basis." However, nothing about it had a legal foundation until the 20th century. The UK had "wardship", the family taking in the child had custody by the Chancery Court. Wardship was not used very often because it did not give the guardian "parental rights". In the 19th century came a "series of baby farming scandals". At the end of the 19th century they started calling it "boarding-out" like they did in Australia. They started placing the children in orphanages and workhouses as well. "The First World War saw an increase in organized adoption through adoption societies and child rescue organizations, and pressure grew for adoption to be given legal status." The first laws based on adoption and foster care were passed in 1926. "The peak number of adoptions was in 1968, since then there has been an enormous decline in adoption in the United Kingdom. The main reasons for children being adopted in the United Kingdom had been unmarried mothers giving up their children for adoption and stepparents adopting their new partner's children".United States
Historians of foster care in America emphasize biases of race and class status that shaped divergent experiences for children. In particular, the United States welfare system has reckoned with a longer history of Black children taken away from their families during slavery. Scholars have also documented the negative conditions faced by often impoverished children during the creation of early orphanages. Prior to protections of Tribes and the right of Indigenous children to remain within their tribal communities such as the 1978 Indian Child Welfare Act, child welfare concerns were cited as reasoning to remove 35% of Indigenous children from their families and tribes.In the United States, formal foster care started as a result of the efforts of Charles Loring Brace, who founded the Children's Aid Society. Taking note that nearly 30,000 homeless or neglected children lived in New York City alone, Brace took these children off the streets and placed them with families around the United States, particularly Christian families living on farms, in an attempt to improve their quality of life. Between 1853 and his death in 1890, Brace transported over 120,000 children by train, giving name to the Orphan Train Movement. When Brace died in 1890, his sons took over his work of the Children's Aid Society until they retired. The foster care approach pioneered by Brace and the Children's Aid Society became the basis for Concurrent Planning, which was the basis of the federal Adoption and Safe Families Act of 1997.
From August 1999 to August 2019, over 9 million American children were removed from their families and placed in foster homes. As of August 2022 there were 368,530 children nationally located in foster homes. On average, an American child in foster care spends two birthdays in the system.
To create a safe environment for the child long term, children in American foster care have both a case plan and a case plan goal. A case plan is a clear statement about why the child needs protection and the roles and responsibilities of all participants in addressing the child's needs and their protection. The case plan goal is the end goal for the child that ends their stay in foster care. 52% of foster children in America have the goal to reunify with their parent or primary caretaker.