Attitudes About Foster Care:
Most participants viewed foster care as a necessary evil or unfortunate necessity. They agreed that foster homes are necessary to provide children a safe place until they can return home. However, the stays should be as short as possible, and never permanent.
Many participants voiced the belief that there are more bad foster homes than good ones.
• I believe the good ones are few and far between.
Participants felt that the quality of foster homes depends on the people running the homes and why they are running the foster homes. They expressed the thought that some people become foster parents because they want to help children, but most foster parents do it for the money, although they did not know how much foster parents are paid or what the responsibilities of foster parents are. Some participants thought that orphanages, like we used to have, might be a viable solution to at least some of the problems in foster care. That not withstanding, participants wanted to be assured that homes are investigated thoroughly before they are licensed, that unannounced visits are regularly made, and that foster parents receive pre-training and on-going training.