THE Child Development Agency (CDA) is seeking to entice more Jamaicans into becoming foster parents, in its efforts to give an increased number of children in state care a sense of family.

“We have thousands of children who are now in state care who need love, individual attention, and who may be carrying psychological scars from their past. We want to just help them to heal and to realise their full potential and have a second chance at life,” CDA communications manager Rashida St Juste told the Observer.

“Not to say that they are dammed in (state) institutions, but you want them to feel loved and to have what all of us want – good, stable families,” she added.

There are currently 5,575 children in the care of the government. Of that number, 1,148 are in foster care with some 800 foster families. The hope, St Juste said, is that another 300 spaces will be made for children in the home of foster parents by the end of the year.

Forming part of those efforts is National Foster Care Week, which ended on Sunday.

They targeted a similar number last year and was able to achieve 240.

“This year again we want 300 new placements or even to surpass that,” St Juste said, adding that their initiative was in line with the objectives of the Child Care and Protection Act and the international Convention on the Rights of the Child.

“So on that basis we have made it one of our strategic objective,” she said.

Foster care, in the meantime, forms part of the agency’s Living in a Family Environment (LIFE) programme, which is aimed enhancing family-based care.

“That programme has more than half the children in state care participating in it. That means that more than half the children we have responsibility for are living in families, whether in home and trial, foster care or supervision order,” St Juste said.

Another aspect of the LIFE programme is called Home and Trial – a community-based programme aimed at returning children on a fit person order to his or her home.

The supervision order, on the other hand, is issued by a court, based on the recommendations of the CDA that the child’s best interest is served when they are in the family, according to St Juste.

LIFE, at the same time, is geared at achieving a range of objectives, including:

. helping fragile families ensure better futures for their children;

. building an effective and supportive welfare system; and

. providing nurturing families for children who have never been exposed to that sort of environment.

Anyone between the ages of 25 and 65 can become a foster parent. A prospective foster parent need only express an interest and thereafter follow some simply steps. Those steps include:

. allowing CDA representatives to inspect their home and to interview family, friends and community members as to their character;

. secure references from two people who are of good repute and who are in a position to substantiate their ability to care for foster children; and

. undertake a medical examination that will attest to their state of health.

In addition, prospective foster parents are required to open their homes to periodic visits and assessments by social workers from the CDA. They must also be willing to allow the foster child to maintain contact with his or her biological parents or relatives, and allow for the re-integration of the child once a recommendation to that effect has been made by the social worker.

Marital status is of little consequence. Lorna Parker, a foster parent for four years, can attest to this. Parker, a resident of Hanover is the single mother of two children, both male – ages 21 and 10. She is also the proud foster parent of five other children, one of whom only recently returned to the children’s home but who is to return to her home on reaching 18. The others are a twin, aged 11; a girl, aged 16, and a 15-year-old boy.

“Them keep mi company a lot. Mi really appreciate them. It’s just me and the kids,” Parker told the Observer last Friday night, the sound of laughter in her voice.

Parker, 41, said she has been fostering children since the death of her aunt, Ivy Parnther, who had asked her to continue caring for the children.

“Mi aunt past away and asked me to take care of them and I really love them. I want to help to go through life,” Parker said.

Foster parents receive a stipend of $4,000 per month, while items such as school uniforms and books are financed by the CDA where families are unable to bear the cost.

In the just concluded National Foster Care Recognition Week, the work of existing foster parents was celebrated, while they were given a chance to share their story of caring for children who are not their own.

“We have a lot of long standing foster parents, some 30 plus hearts who we just really needed to recognise their contribution to national development. We also wanted to highlight family-based care as an integral part of the services we offer to children in state care,” said the CDA’s St Juste.

“It is just about opening up your heart and your home to children who need love. They may be safe in institutions, which provide a certain level of care and protection. but you can’t neglect the emotional side of things. And the best place for them to get that is within a family,” she said.