How do I make a referral? Is therapy available for children and young people? Is the cost of therapy included in the fee? Can I arrange for contact to be supervised? If I place a child with you, what support is available for the carers? Is education available? If I place a child with you who needs life story work, can you provide this? If a child is excluded from school, what can you provide? What is included in the placement fee? What is not included in the placement fee? What training do you offer to foster carers? Can I make a referral out of office hours? What provision can you make to facilitate meetings? How do I make a referral? You can make a referral by contacting one of our social work teams, either by telephone or fax. Click here to find your local office. Alternatively, you can e-mail the details of your referral to us and one of our social workers will contact you. back to top Is therapy available for children and young people? Yes. Futures for Children can offer a variety of therapeutic methods, tailored to suit the individual needs of the child, including long term intensive approaches and short term focused interventions. back to top Is the cost of therapy included in the fee? Yes. In order to prevent unnecessary delays for the children and young people who require it, therapy is included in our basic fee. back to top Can I arrange for contact to be supervised? Yes. Futures for Children have a number of sessional workers who are able to supervise contact for children and young people and this service includes a written report. To discuss supervised contact and any other sessional work needs, please contact your local office. back to top If I place a child with you, what support is available for the carers? Futures for Children offer comprehensive and ongoing support to foster carers, including regular training sessions and support groups. Once approved by our panel, every foster carer is allocated a supervising social worker who will contact them both by means of regular visits and telephone calls. Foster carers are always welcome to contact their supervising social worker, or another member of the social work team, for any advice they may need during office hours. We also operate an out of hours service, enabling foster carers to access the support and advice they need twenty four hours a day. back to top Is education available? Futures for Children have a record of success in introducing children into education in all regions of the country. On occasions when children have to wait for a school placement, Futures for Children are able to utilise other services such as individual tuition. We also require that sessional support is provided for the foster carers in recognition of the child being at home full time. back to top If I place a child with you who needs life story work, can you provide this? Yes, we can. Training in life story work is regularly offered to foster carers, and many of our foster carers like to carry out life story work with the children and young people in their care when appropriate, with the advice and assistance of our social work staff. back to top If a child is excluded from school, what can you provide? If a placed child or young person is excluded from school, Futures for Children requires that ten hours sessional work per week will be provided to support the placement. Additional sessional work and any specific requirements can be negotiated on an individual basis. back to top What is included in the placement fee? Futures for Children’s basic weekly charge includes: • professional fees and fostering allowances to foster carers • replacement clothing costs • pocket money • birthday and Christmas allowances • three weeks holiday pay per year pro rata • individual therapy, counselling or direct work by therapists where required • local travelling costs – transport within a 25 mile return trip of the foster home back to top What is not included in the placement fee? Although Futures for Children include as many facilities as possible within the basic placement fee, including therapy, the following items are excluded from the basic weekly charge: • initial clothing allowance • school uniform allowance • medical, dental or opthalmic treatment, other than routine testing or examination • transport, other than local travelling costs (local travelling costs being within a 25 mile round trip of the foster home) back to top What training do you offer to foster carers? All Futures for Children foster carers undertake the agency’s preparation training and, once approved, are supported to participate alongside staff and sessional workers in our comprehensive training programme. More experienced carers are supported to undertake NVQ courses. Recent training sessions have included training on first aid, safer caring, child protection, valuing diversity, managing challenging behaviour and preparing adolescents for independence. back to top Can I make a referral out of office hours? Futures for Children operate a twenty four hour service, including an out of hours telephone service staffed by qualified social workers who will have information available to them regarding current vacancies should an urgent placement be required. back to top What provision can you make to facilitate meetings? Many of Futures for Children’s local offices have a variety of facilities, including contact suites and meeting rooms. If you require the use of such facilities please do not hesitate to contact us to discuss your needs.