Specialist Foster Carers
Making a Difference - Being Part of our Fostering Journey
Every child in our care is as unique as you are, and every child has a different family situation and therefore needs a different type of care. One type of care is Fostering. There are many ways to foster including long term, short term, respite, emergency and specialist.
All our fostering roles require people who are child centred, kind, patient, emotionally and physically resilient, persistent and can act as a child's champion.
Specialist Fostering Scheme
Specialist Foster Care Roles - receive up to £1000 per week
St Helens Specialist Fostering Scheme has been developed to care for our children with complex needs who have had adverse childhood experiences from trauma or difficult childhood experiences.
For these children, we need special people who can provide stable and supportive homes, who can build positive relationships that help grow trust, help a child feel understood, heard, and help them to begin to make sense of their past experiences.
Our Specialist Foster Carers have experience of working with children or teenagers and understand how past trauma can manifest itself in behaviours that others might find difficult. Our Specialist Foster Carers are well supported and are part of a child's network, working in partnership with other professionals and have 24/7 support from professionals and specialists.
As a Specialist Foster Carer, we ask that you
- Are caring, child-centred and can act as a champion for the child or young person who comes into your care.
- Have 'stickability' - providing unconditional stability and encouragement to a young person, even whilst challenging unacceptable behaviour if needed.
- Are able to provide support if there are challenges engaging with education.
- Are available full time to care for the child or young person who comes into your care.
- Feel excited about working therapeutically, learning new approaches and being able to make a difference to a child's life.
What you will need to do
- Successfully complete our foster care assessment
- Live within St Helens or within an hour's drive
- Fulfil a successful DBS Check
What we will provide
- A comprehensive induction programme.
- Peer support from Foster Carers
- Bespoke training and development programme from all partner agencies
- A secure on-line forum and network
- Regular supervision and support
- Celebration and family events as part of the St Helens Fostering Family
- A professional fee of up to £1,000 per week
Interested to Find Out More?
You can review our job description and person specification in the two links below:
- Specialist Foster Carer Job Description (Word doc) [229KB]
- Specialist Foster Carer Person Specification (Word doc) [228KB]
Visit our Fostering pages to find more detail about our service or if you would like an informal chat before applying you can email Letty our Fostering Team Manager or visit our Children's services pages to see what our colleagues have to say and discover our full range of in work benefits.
Made your Decision
If like our existing Foster Carers you have decided that St Helens is the right place to Foster for you, you can apply online through our easy to use fostering application form.
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