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Aging out of the foster care system essay
Aging out of the foster care system essay
Aging out of the foster care system essay
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According to the CCAI, Today, there are 397,122 children living today without permanent families in the foster care system. 101,666 of these children can be adopted, but nearly 32% of these kids will have to wait more than three years in foster care to be adopted. And according to Orlando Weekly, in the last 24 months, the number of children in out-of-home care has reached 22,004 Statewide, it has gone up 25% since 2013. As many people know the foster care system is lacking Foster homes and many of these kids are aging out of the system, and also many of these kids are being abused and neglected by their foster parents or parent. As Megan Hilton said “Foster parents do not get paid, they do get a non-taxable income. This reimbursement is increased as the child gets older, however, it isn’t enough to actually care for the child.” Which can be one of the reasons why these children in the Fostering system are abused and neglected. The Foster Care System needs to make more programs in order to help the foster children, such as tutoring and mental and emotional help. …show more content…
According to heritage program: “The scholarship opportunity program would be designed to ensure that the state does not create adverse incentives and adoption.” With the scholarship given to the foster child, the foster parent would try to find the best educational opportunities, so the child would be given a better future. But there should not be only educational scholarships, there should be scholarships for foster children with disabilities because foster children should be given an equal chance to have a good life and education and a better future. Both of these scholarships would be provided to the foster children and the foster parent or whoever has authority over the child would choose the school that best fits the
This paper will contain research done about foster care, including a brief history and progressing along to the system today. This research interested me because it is a professional career option after graduation. I found both positives and negatives about the foster care system that children and foster parents go through on a daily basis. As the paper progresses I will be explaining these positives and negatives in more detail. Throughout the paper I will be referencing different scholarly sources that explain foster care in different ways. Overall, this paper will show different aspects that the general public may never know about foster care.
There is nearly 400,000 children in out-of-home care in the United States right now (Children’s Right). Just about every day children are being shipped in and out of foster homes and group homes. Most people want the best for children in foster care and decide to take care of them until their parents can possibly recover. The foster care system can have both a negative or positive effect on children, foster parents, and biological parents because of the gaps in the system. Foster cannot not be avoided but the some aspects of the foster care system can be avoided if the missing gaps were filled.
Some parents in the world do not discipline their children and do not care what the children. All they care about are them selves. At that point the social workers take the child and put them in foster homes with complete and total strangers. Some companies just put kids with people who do not care about the children just what they get paid. They just let the children go off and do what they want and do not supervise the children’s activities. The social workers should do more thoroughly background checks. There should also be more supervision in foster homes instead of little supervision, and the workers should visit the home and the children more often than they actually do.
Addressing the needs of children in foster care has been an issue that has tried to be addressed in many ways. In 2001, approximately 300,000 children entered the foster care system, with the average time spent in placement equaling 33 months (Bass Shields, & Behrman, n.d.). Statistically, the longer a child is in the foster care system, the greater number of placements they will have, and instability increases each year (Bass Shields, & Behrman, n.d). I recently read a novel by a girl who was placed into the system at age two, and by age 12 she had already experienced 14 different placements (Rhodes-Courter, 2007). Stories such as this one are not uncommon in the foster care system, especially if the child is a member of a sibling group or
In 2002, 51,000 children were adopted through the foster care system. The federal government tracks the number of adoptions from the United States foster care system, and all of its international adoptions. It’s estimated that around 120,000 children are adopted by U.S citizens each year. Half of these children are adopted by individuals not related to t...
Many aspiring foster parent anticipated the increase in their expenses once they added a member in their family but one thing that surprised many is that there is a upfront cost that they will need to pay before they received their adoptee. “You may be shocked to learn that there are few costs to adopting a child. Or you may be surprised to discover that not every adoption costs thousands of dollars.” (financing). Theres is no recruitment agency that will cover that cost not even the government. And I think some people who planned to adopt and once they realized the cost that they need to pay first, they back out and the will keep the children in the foster care and that’s why we have a lot of kids there. The organization that I chose helps the potential foster parents to understand their options to how they can afford to
One of the biggest misconceptions that we have in our country is that foster care is a great thing; well, it’s not. There are so many flaws in our foster care system to even consider it a good idea. With constant reports of abuse, depression, lack of stability, to even the terrible after effects of the foster care system, like homelessness and incarceration; the foster care system hurts more than it helps. Our foster care system is bad for America, but most of all, our children.
In the United States there are approximately 397,000 children in out-of home care, within the last year there was about 640,000 children which spent at least some time in out-of-home care. More than 58,000 children living in foster care have had their biological parental rights permanently terminated (Children’s Rights, 2014). Due to the rising number of children in foster care and the growing concerns of the safety, permanency, and well-being of children and families, the Adoption and Safe Families Act of 1997 was signed into law. On November 19, 1997, President Bill Clinton signed the Adoption and Safe Families Act of 1997, to improve the safety of children, to promote adoption and other permanent homes for children who need them, and to support families (Child Welfare League of America). The Adoption and Safe Families Act also promotes adoption by offering incentive payments for States. During the FY of 1999-2003 the payment to states which had exceeded the average number of adoptions received $20 million (Child Welfare League of America). The ASFA improved the existing federal child welfare law to require that the child’s health and safety be a “paramount” concern in any efforts made by the state to preserve or reunify the child’s family, and to provide new assurances that children in foster care are safe (Shuman, 2004).
In todays’ society many Americans never think about our foster care system. Foster care is when a child is temporarily placed with another family. This child may have been abused, neglected, or may be a child who is dependent and can survive on their own but needs a place to stay. Normally the child parents are sick, alcohol or drug abusers, or may even be homeless themselves. We have forgotten about the thousands of children who are without families and living in foster homes. Many do not even know how foster care came about. A few of the earliest documentation of foster care can be found in the Old Testament. The Christian church put children into homes with widowers and then paid them using collection from the church congregation. The system that the church had in place was actually successful, and was continued to be used until English Poor Law eventually regulated family foster care in the U.S.
The majority of children who would otherwise need foster care are in kinship care, which
With foster care, foster parents get paid monthly by the state to ensure the children are taken care of. Each child gets an allowance every month to have for spending money. The Department of Children Services (DCS) gives the foster families that adopt money for the children until they turn eighteen, and even before adoption the state sends money for helping take care of foster children. According to the Tennessee Department of Children Services. “When children are not able to stay safely in their own homes and there isn’t a relative who can care for them, they often have to come into state custody. The department’s first goal for children is to work toward a safe return home to their families” (1 Foster care and Adoption). Another form of adoption can be through private agencies. Private agencies allow a person to adopt and choose if it is open or closed. Open adoption is when the child can still see his or her birth parents. Closed adoption is when the parents decided they do not want to see the children. In both cases of open and closed adoption most of the time the child or children are infants and straight from birth go to a family, in some of these cases the parents are young and cannot afford to take care of the child so they choose to let him or her be better off with people that can give them everything they will ever want or need. According to Sally Allphin in the scholarly journal article, “President Clinton’s Adoption 2002 Initiative, which intends to double the number of children who move into adoption or legal guardianship between 1986 and 2002. Each year, states will receive four thousand or six thousand dollars for each adoption that they complete above their projected baselines” (1). Getting attached to foster children is an uncommon thing, but in rare cases the children either go back to their parents or a relative chooses to take the
which prove that a foster home is not the solution to help children in need. Although the
One article about the harms of aging out states, "Each year, about 30,000 foster care youth age out of the system. Many of them exit without finding a stable, affordable, permanent living arrangement" (Richards 2). After aging out, former foster children also face problems going off to post-secondary school and finding jobs. This is because to apply for a job, one must provide proof of a home address. If someone is homeless, that makes getting a job so much harder. Nevertheless, the system does try its hardest to prevent issues like this from arising. There are programs like Section 8 Housing, Family Unification Programs (FUP), and Continuum of Care services, which help foster care children and teenagers after they have aged out. This being said, not many foster care youth know about these programs. It should be the job of the caseworker involved with the child to inform them of these programs. Furthermore, there is a stigma against children in foster care and those who have aged out. This may be a factor in why some do not apply for such programs. Foster care and adopted children are a part of almost every community, so society should try its best to include them and not blame
According to the International Foster Care Organization “Foster care is a way of providing a family life for children who cannot live with their own parents.”(2004) Foster care is supposed to provide temporary care while parents get help dealing with problems, or to help children or young people through a difficult period in their lives. Children will return home once their parents are able to provide a safe enviorment for them. However if parent are unable to resolve the issues that cause their child in foster care their children may stay in long-term foster care, some may be adopted, and others will move on to live independently. (IFCO, 2004) Foster care has been a problem for many years and although there have been many attempts to improve it; it there still seems to be negatively impacting
Based off the attention from modern media, youth homelessness has been on an unfortunate upslope in the United States within the past decade. Various factors tie into why this issue is becoming more prominent such as low income households being unable to afford children, LGBT youth rejection, and domestic abuse leading to children leaving home. Now, vagrancy has a severely negative impact on the development of young people as it inhibits them from developing academically, socially, and mentally and can also expose them to diseases and potentially various types of abuse, such as sexual and substance abuse. This is an issue that should be addressed, for the rising generations are America’s future, and so investing in the overall well-being of the