Training and Support

Thank you for your inquiry! We will reach out to you soon. If you have any immediate questions, please contact Jackie Harwig at 913-956-5319 or jharwig@kvc.org.

KVC provides an unparalleled level of training and support to foster families. We will equip you to provide the best care for a child in need to ensure the best possible experience and long-term outcome for that child.

nebraska foster careThe training and support we offer is three-fold:

  • Before becoming a foster family
  • When you start providing foster care
  • Ongoing training and support

Before You Foster: Training Classes

KVC Kansas uses Trauma-Informed Partnering for Safety and Permanence-Model Approach to Partnerships in Parenting (TIPS-MAPP) to train a large group of potential foster parents.

TIPS-MAPP assists KVC in addressing the six federal family and children services review outcomes by addressing them with prospective foster and adoptive parents:

  • Incidence of child abuse and neglect in foster care
  • Recurrence of  maltreatment
  • Foster care reentries
  • Length of time to achieve reunification
  • Length of time to achieve adoption
  • Stability of foster care placement

The goal of the TIPS-MAPP program is to enable foster families to achieve the following core competencies:

  • Foster and foster/adoptive parents will be able to meet the developmental and well-being needs of children and youth coming into foster care, or being adopted through foster care
  • Foster and foster/adoptive parents will be able to meet the safety needs of children and youth coming into foster care, or being adopted through foster care
  • Foster parents will be able to share parenting with a child’s family
  • Foster parents will be able to support concurrent planning for permanency
  • Foster and foster/adoptive parents will be able to meet their family’s needs in ways that assure a child’s safety and wellbeing

As potential foster families participate in TIPS-MAPP, the group leaders conduct ongoing assessments of each group member or family. The assessment is based on the “Twelve Criteria for Successful Fostering and Adopting.” The criteria are as follows:

  • Know your own family. Assess your individual and family strengths and needs; build on strengths and meet needs.
  • Communicate effectively. Use and develop communication skills needed to foster or adopt.
  • Know the children. Identify the strengths and needs of children and youth who have been abused, neglected, abandoned, and/or emotionally maltreated.
  • Build strengths; meet needs. Build on the strengths and meet the needs of the children placed in your home.
  • Work in partnership. Develop partnerships with children and youth, birth/adoptive families, the agency, and the community to develop and carry out plans for permanency.
  • Be loss and attachment experts. Help children and youth develop skills to manage loss and attachment.
  • Manage behaviors. Help children and youth manage behaviors.
  • Build connections. Help children and youth maintain and develop relationships that keep them connected to their pasts.
  • Build self-esteem. Help children and youth build upon positive self-concept and positive family, cultural and racial identity.
  • Assure health and safety. Provide a healthy and safe environment for children and youth and keep them free from harm.
  • Assess impact. Assess the way fostering and/or adopting will affect your family.
  • Make an informed decision. Make an informed decision to foster and/or adopt.

When a potential foster parent completes TIPS-MAPP, the leader makes a recommendation as to the capability of the potential foster parent to provide care for children.

Please view our events calendar for upcoming training classes.

When You Start Providing Foster Care

When you start providing foster care to a child, KVC will assign a foster care specialist to you. He/she will provide initial support within 24-48 hours of a child coming to stay with you. This will include:

  • Explaining KVC expectations, payment cycles and other roles and responsibilities
  • Providing pertinent contact information of all team members including on-call phone numbers
  • Assuring all intake documentation is received at the time of placement. This includes but is not limited to the placement authorization/agreement, medical consent, superintendent’s letter, Child Placement Acknowledgment Form, acknowledgement of the discipline agreement ascertaining that all of the information is clear and understood, and completion of the personal item inventory.

Ongoing Training and Support

Ongoing support from KVC will include:

  • Face-to-face contacts per the child/youth’s level of care with foster parent and child/youth (Note: We also ensure that face-to-face contact occurs with verbal child/youth privately – away from the foster parent – to ensure the child/youth feels safe and all needs are being appropriately met).
  • Phone/email contact on weeks when face-to-face contact is not occurring
  • Assist in crisis support and problem-solving
  • Provide 24/7 crisis response and support
  • Annual training through expert speakers at our Resource Family Conference

Still determining if foster parenting is right for you? Check out these free resources to help you decide: