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Feature TYLA Project

A Welcoming Home:  Be a Foster Parent
By: Sally Pretorius, Andrae Law PLLC

In honor of National Foster Care Month, TYLA will be launching a new public service project called “A Welcoming Home: Be a Foster Parent” for the month of May. A Welcoming Home was the brainchild of TYLA President C.E. Rhodes, whose family has strong connections to the foster care community. Several of C.E.’s extended family have opened their homes to foster children, and C.E. was able to experience first-hand the benefits and the impact of a loving foster home.

Often when a family undergoes a traumatic experience or an emergency (e.g., a parent becoming an addict, an unsafe home, or the death or incarceration of a parent), children will need to be placed in a new home. Many times relatives of the children aren’t available or willing to take children into their homes, therefore creating a need for families to open up their homes as foster homes for the children.

With almost 28,000 children in the foster-care system at any given time, there are sometimes shortages of families willing or qualified to take children into their homes for an extended period of time. There are also a disproportionate number of available placement families in specific areas. When children are removed from their homes and need a foster-care placement, the agencies prefer to place the children in a familiar community to help alleviate some of the children’s trauma. For example, if a child can stay in the same school or in the same neighborhood, it prevents a complete uprooting for the child and eases the time in foster care.

How is TYLA helping? We have created a program to get the word out to professional, social, and civic organizations about the current need for foster-care families (specifically in the underrepresented communities), the requirements for becoming a foster-care family, and the resources available for foster-care families. If you are interested in having TYLA do a brief presentation to your organization, please contact Sally Pretorius or Patrice Childress.