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Home is the best place for the satisfaction of the physical, mental and emotional needs of children. Whenever due to desertion, divorce, long illness, imprisonment, death etc. of a parent, a child has to be removed from his home, it is always advisable to place him in an environment which is as near as a home. Foster care placement and adoption services are the means to achieve results based on this basic philosophy of working with the children.
Meaning of Foster Home
The child may be placed in an institution immediately when any of the above-mentioned emergencies arise, but a social work agency should consider the placement of a child either in his own family or a home where he can get a good substitute for home care. One of the methods of fulfilling this need of a child is the foster home placement, which means that the child stays with a family where the foster parents look after the needs of the child as of their own child, for which they are sometimes paid either by the parents or by the social agency or both.
Definition and need for Foster care
As a child welfare service, foster care has certain distinguishing characteristics. It is arranged by a public or voluntary social agency (although an unknown number of children are living in foster homes or institutions under arrangements made by their parents independently of a social agency). Foster care is fulltime care, 24 hours a day, outside the child's own home. This care may be given within a foster family home, an agency group home, or an institution. In contrast to adoption, foster care implies a temporary arrangement - an expectation that the child will be enabled to return to his or her parents' home, be placed for adoption, or be discharged from agency care upon reaching legal maturity. Using social' work methods, the agency tries to play a major role in planning and carrying out the child's care. To be effective, this broad child-rearing responsibility has to be shared with parents, the court, and other institutions of the community.
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