It’s fair to say that Foster Care Fortnight™ 2023 has been our biggest yet! We kickstarted the two weeks with the first ever fostering event at 10 Downing Street, celebrating fostering and hearing speeches from Mockingbird hub home carers. 

Foster carers had real conversations with the Secretary of State for Education, Gillian Keegan, and Claire Coutinho, Minister for Children, Families and Wellbeing, about what changes are needed to improve foster care. This blog includes reflections from Eddie, Jim and Mike who came to the event. 

We share a few of the highlights of Foster Care Fortnight™ 2023 

Lisa became a foster carer 16 years ago, after plans to become a kinship carer for a friend’s baby fell through. She shares her fostering journey – explaining why choosing to become a foster carer is the best thing she’s ever done.

Bethany Shelton is a project worker at The Fostering Network for our Moving On project. She is also the daughter of foster carers and carried out research whilst at university exploring how other children of foster carers make sense of family. This research was recently published in the Scottish Journal of Residential Child Care, and Bethany shares an extract of it with us.

The Fostering Network’s Director of Practice and Scotland, Jacqueline Cassidy, reflects on what #FosteringCommunities mean to carers as we enter the second week of Foster Care Fortnight™. 

As we approach the end of  Foster Care Fortnight™ 2023, our director for Northern Ireland, Kathleen Toner, shares her message for foster carers, the impact they have on children and young people and importantly, calls for more people to join our #FosteringCommunities. 
 

Step Up Step Down (SUSD) is a pioneering approach in Northern Ireland to support families on the edge of care. It demonstrates a reduction in the numbers of children coming into care, and improved outcomes for children and families. 

Anne’s family joined SUSD in Spring 2022 – she shares how being referred to the programme ‘changed everything’ and helped her through the most difficult time in her life. 

When organisations come together with a shared purpose, some fantastic things can happen. That’s what Liverpool City Council fostering service and their local John Lewis store have set out to do, as the Council aims to recruit more foster carers in the city. We hear from Liverpool’s fostering team about their joint efforts and plans for the
future

Courtney is a care experienced young person who nominated her foster carers, Pauline and Jimmy, for the Northern Ireland Foster Care Awards last June. She explains how their unwavering support helped heal her past and give her hope for the future 

Mervyn Erskine is chair of trustee's at The Fostering Network and a full-time foster carer. He kicks off Foster Care Fortnight™ with a special thanks to everyone in our #FosteringCommunities and shares his feelings about being part of the community himself