What is Foster Care?
What is foster care? When a child’s birth parents are unable to care for them due to abuse or neglect, the child is placed in state custody – in foster care. Foster care was established as a temporary arrangement where children are placed in the care of other families while their birth family gets the help they need. In order to achieve reunification with their children, birth parents are asked to work through a case plan to correct the reasons that brought the children into foster care.
In Georgia, there are roughly 11,800 children in foster care because they have been abused, neglected or abandoned. Around 6,000 of those children are in need of foster homes.
These families need the church and foster families’ support and encouragement.
Many times foster families have the opportunity to also walk alongside biological parents, serving them during times of need. Sometimes reunification with the parents or relatives isn’t possible, and in those cases, the children become available for adoption.
We have a great need for foster parents to provide safe, loving, temporary homes for these children.
The opportunity to be part of a family and to get the kind of care and help they need can change a child’s life – as well as their family’s.