Foster care is a social service that has been harmoniously adjusted to the needs of the child and the family, and it offers trust, support, and progress – this is the declaration of a group of specialists and practitioners in child care, who participated recently in a workshop organized by Partnerships for Every Child (P4EC).
The workshop participants are specialists from Social Assistance and Family Protection Departments of Falesti, Calarasi, Cahul, Ungheni, Soroca raions. They met with P4EC experts to discuss activity plans to develop Respite and Emergency Foster Care in their raions.
The event is taking place within the project “Supporting local public authorities of Moldova in the provision of alternative family-type care to children without parental care”. The project plans a series of training and methodological activities aiming to build the capacities of service providers and decision makers, in the development of Respite and Emergency Foster Care.
Olga Zaharia, Manager of the Foster Care Service of the Municipal Child’s Rights Protection Department:
“As a result of piloting respite care in Chisinau and Orhei, 10 foster parents in each district were trained. About 30 children with disabilities have been provided this type of placement up to the present”.
Irina Spivacenco, P4EC expert:
“While this service is continuingly developing, we vitally need to strengthen it by diversifying types of placements in order to meet the needs of all groups of children who need help”.
In Respite Placement children with special needs are placed into a foster family for several days, to give a short break to their care givers, who can use this time to recover.
Emergency placement provides emergency foster care to a child, for a period of 72 hours up to a month.
Partnerships for Every Child is developing this service based on a Collaboration Agreement with the Ministry of Labour, Social Protection and Family, and the Local Public Authorities.