Cornerways Fostering Services offers a variety of different types of foster placements to meet the needs of different children and their circumstances. Some of our Foster Carers focus on one type of fostering, while others may undertake more than one type. We value every child as being an individual and every fostering household as individual.
- Short Term Fostering
- Long Term / Permanent Fostering
- Respite Fostering
- Parent and Baby Fostering
- Unaccompanied Children (from outside UK)
Short Term Fostering
Short term fostering may last a few weeks to around 18 months; it provides a safe home while a child’s situation is assessed and plans made for them. Sometimes this will include Court proceedings which involve Carers in keeping records and writing reports. Short term placements often involve Foster Carers working closely with other agencies as well as helping the child and their own family to stay in contact. Many children will return home to their family after a period of short term fostering; a few will move on to adoption or long term fostering elsewhere. To achieve this their short term Foster Carers will be involved in preparing the children to move and helping their new family with the move. Some short term Foster Carers may be able to care for and help young people who have become involved in offending behaviour and are remanded or bailed into foster care.
Long Term / Permanent Fostering
Some children and young people need a stable foster family for the rest of their childhood because they cannot return to their birth family and adoption is not suitable for them. These children need a foster family who will commit to them through the ups and downs of being a teenager and growing up. It is very important that when we match a long term child with their long term Foster Carers we take account of all of their interests, lifestyle and skills so that the family and the child all feel comfortable together, can enjoy some similar interest and are able to get through the easy and the less easy stages of growing up. Long term fostering involves helping a young person learn skills for adulthood for managing finances, holding down a job or gaining further education, making and enjoying friendships and relationships and running a home.
Respite Fostering
Respite Foster Carers provide foster care for a few nights or a few weeks, sometimes a regular weekend. This may be to support a birth family or foster family in their care of a child, or maybe to enable a Foster Carer to have a break to recharge themselves.
Parent(s) and Baby Fostering
Parent(s) and baby fostering is a growing specialism for Cornerways Fostering. This is in response to an increasing need for placements where a Mother or Father (or both) can live in a foster home with their newborn or very young children. These placements usually last 3‑4 months and require high levels of involvement, supervision and support by the Foster Carers, together with a great deal of record keeping and the ability to work with both adults and babies. For these placements the foster home needs to have a good amount of space and a bedroom big enough to provide space for the parent and child. Cornerways has specific policies, recording processes and Foster Carer training to deliver parent(s) and baby foster care.
Unaccompanied Children
Some of our Foster Carers can offer short or long term placements for children who are unaccompanied in the UK. These young people have a variety of individual needs depending upon their experiences and how they arrived in the UK.
