EXTENDING EXTENDED FOSTER CARE
For New Zealand and Australia, I reckon it’s been a good week on COVID-19. While not necessarily the case for North America and Europe, most of New Zealand has returned to level 1 restrictions with Auckland not far behind, cases in Victoria have dropped significantly, and with little or no community transmission in several Australian states and territories there is now a real prospect of some limited Trans-Tasman travel resuming soon.
However, while continuing to simultaneously ‘spin the plates’ of COVID-19 and business as usual, with most Western countries now officially in recession and long-term economic and employment prospects still looking grim, it’s time for organisations to add a third plate if they haven’t done so already – planning for recession and unemployment.
Over the last 3 weeks I have been delivering a free public webinar Getting Recession-ready: Education, training and unemployment that many of you attended. In it I explored a number of strategies that organisations could pursue to help ensure that young people in care and care leavers are not further disadvantaged through the months and years to come. In my view one of the ‘easiest’ and most effective to do in a well-functioning statutory child welfare system, is to extend extended care.
Do you already have a scheme? If so, looking at the above diagram, determine whether your existing extended care scheme has a narrow or board focus, and whether take up by young people so far has been high or low. On that basis your best immediate focus is likely to be either:
1. Realise potential e.g. promote with young people and stakeholders including carers, the benefits of remaining in extended care for the full three year period i.e. up until age of 21
2. Redesign parameters e.g. increase eligible groups
3. Remove blockages e.g. ensure that the right people have the right information about the scheme at the right time
4. Rethink scope e.g. ask young people and foster carers what they’d want from the scheme
Don’t have an extended care scheme or still trialling? Consider these:
5. Enact temporary legislation or policy (moratorium) enabling young people to continue, if they wish, with same care arrangements beyond their 18th birthday (or other latest care leaving age).
6. Fast-track existing trials: If we can fast track a COVID-19 cure for the world, we can probably find ways to appropriately fast-track an existing extended care trial.
7. Dispense with a trial altogether and support policy decisions and design on the basis of existing national and international evidence and evidence-based practices.
One important caveat: I said earlier that in a well-functioning statutory child welfare system, extending extended care was one of the ‘easiest‘ strategic responses to recession and unemployment for young people in care and care leavers. However, if yours is not a well-functioning system, your organisation individually or with others may also need to focus on broader challenges whether that be foster carer retention, placement stability, social worker turnover, trust issues, or listening to the views of young people.
I’d love to hear your thoughts! You can email me at: iain@betteroutcomes.co.nz
Kia kaha (Stay Strong).
Iain