The best place to thrive?

Home life as we understand it

is no more natural to us

than a cage is natural to a cockatoo.

George Bernard Shaw

Can't help wondering...what you're wondering about?

While I was out visiting around the net, I stopped to chat a bit at Imaginif...Child Protection was Serious Business. Nothing surprising about that as it remains a favorite site, frequently visited. I found myself getting carried away about child abuse and neglect...nothing surprising about that either?!...this time in terms of foster care, residential care, etc. and what environment is in the best interest of a child. I realized I'd gone far beyond Charmayne's focus, and even my usual comment lengths, so decided to return "home" to finish my wondering for now.



You might want to see Charmayne Paul's post, Residential and Specialized Care Models: Outcomes for Children in Out-of-Home Care, to put the following in the context that set my mind to wondering...

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Hi Charmayne, Yes to young people participating in debates on foster care, residential facilities and such! I hope we "get it" soon, that children's perspectives are valid and more informed about many things we may never learn through artificially constructed research and longitudinal studies.

As I was reading your post and thinking about my personal opinion that high quality, residential facilities (fully staffed and supported with the best people for each position, of course!) could be the most viable solution, at this time, world-wide, for many of the ever increasing child abuse and neglect cases, as well as for the serious behavioral cases, a pop-up alerted me to the following e-mail that coincidentally is related to this discussion:
Orphaned Children Show Higher Intelligence And Fare Better In Foster Care Than In Institutions

However as interesting as I found it, I remain convinced that the residential alternative needs to be explored as an option since foster care is so abysmal in most cases, and privatized home visitation care (here in the USA) is proving to be another way for some to make money with a minimum of actual delivery of services.
Being an optimist in some cases...one case being a hope for the children of tomorrow, if not today...I can't help thinking about possibilities that combine some of the failings of society in order to promote other alternatives. For example, quality residential facilities that provide for the safety, health, education and general welfare of children, augmented by programs of some degree of stipend for "foster grandparents," or "foster families" committed to the development of long term relationships with a child or siblings, to provide the nuturance and stability that extended families can. I see them providing that element of time intensive "specialness" that can be lost in residential care, writing, phone calls, visits, taking child for holidays, etc. There are so many children needing loving relationships and so many able adults who do as well, but programs that try to fill that need here, like Big Brothers/Big Sisters, Foster Grandparents, etc. leave too much to be desired. And too much risk to the children because of insufficient oversight. Given a residential facility interactions between adult and child can be observed randomly...

Sorry! It occurs to me that I am getting carried away here as a comment so I'm returning to my blog where anyone interested can pick up any additional ramblings...
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Seems like I have more passion for this idea than I realized and therefore need to do some research on the subject rather than rambling on in an apparently manic phase!

For starters, about the need for the debates globally, today's news contained the usual assortment of children abused, neglected, even murdered at home, in foster care, under DYFS supervision, and so forth:

Weld County probed in deaths of 7 year olds

More Florida children die from abuse

Charge dismissed in child death case

The Jakarta Post: Child abuse on the rise in RI: Commission

And the news also contained a variety of articles addressing failing systems, and alternative options such as:
Foster care numbers move upward in 'Lake of the Ozarks
Plans Goal: Less Foster Care
Missouri needs to bolster services to poor children


Obviously the idea of residential care as an alterantive for abused and neglected children, of all ages and circumstances covers more territory than I realized, and deserves some serious attention. At it's base, the concepts of home and family must be explored. Are the best of both what we have declared them to be, or like any other social constructs are they subject to change...perhaps for the better? Can the ideal home and family considered so important as a determinant of the environment in the best interests of a child be something yet unknown, yet to be constructed? So, as I gather more information, I'll be adding to this idea in the days to come. Please jump in with any of your thoughts or sources of information!

A Child is Waiting,
Take care...be aware,
Nancy Lee