Fostering in Harrow

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Caring for children and young people who live in Harrow

Our fostering community is made up of truly passionate, caring and experienced social work staff and carers. If you become a Harrow Foster carer, you become part of our 'Fostering Family'.

Some children are unable to be cared for by their own parents for a variety of reasons. Choosing to foster for Harrow Council means that these children and young people can remain geographically close to their family home. This means in most cases they can continue going to the same school or nursery, church or faith group and regularly see the friends they have made. Most importantly, they can continue to see their parents, siblings and extended family members on supervised visits without having to travel too far.

Fostering with your local council keeps children and young people who need foster care in the local community, in familiar surroundings that we know can provide a better outcome for them as they grow up.

Benefits, allowances and support

Becoming a foster carer can be a hugely rewarding but challenging journey. With us, you’re never alone - you’ll get to meet lots of other foster carers and people who are passionate about transforming the lives of the children in their care. We offer:

Financial support

  • A weekly fee and allowance of up to £367 per week per child
  • Birthday and religious festival allowances
  • Holiday payments paid every April
  • A refer-a-friend scheme
  • Enhanced and specialist rates of up to £700 per week per child
  • Start-up items, if required

Ongoing support

  • You will have your own supervising social worker who you can contact whenever you need their support. They will visit you every 4 to 6 weeks for supervision and will identify any training needs you might have.
  • Harrow Virtual School psychology service offer in-depth training and individual support to foster carers and direct therapeutic work with children and young people in their care.
  • Access to an emergency duty team outside of office hours.
  • Support and guidance from the Harrow Foster Carers Association (HFCA).
  • Monthly support group for foster carers.
  • A regular newsletter for Harrow foster carers.
  • Social events for foster carers over the course of the year.
  • Foster carers' annual award ceremony.
  • Free membership to the Fostering Network.
  • Blue Light Card membership.

Transfer to Harrow

Already a foster carer and looking for a change?

We offer a fast-track service to make it easy for approved foster carers to join us. We're always keen to hear from existing foster carers.

We work within the Fostering Network transfer of foster carers' protocol to ensure that the transfer from your current agency to us is a smooth process for you and your current agency, ensuring continuity of care for any children in your care during the transfer.

You can only be registered with one fostering agency at a time.

So once you have given written notice to your current agency of your intention to transfer, we will work with you to map out a timeframe for when you can transfer to our service.

We will need to undertake our own assessment, but with the information provided by your current agency, we hope to be able to complete the assessment as soon as possible.

What are the steps to becoming a foster carer with Harrow?

Step 1 - Make contact

Call Foster with West London on 020 8753 1075 or join us to hear more at one of our information sessions. During this initial call we will provide you with advice and support you to make a decision as to whether it is the right time for you to foster.

If you are ready to progress with your journey to becoming a foster carer, an initial enquiry will be completed over the phone to learn more about you and your family. If you meet the initial screening criteria, you will be passed to the local authority you want to foster for who will book an initial home visit and a member of the team will visit you.

Step 2 - Training

Attend our Skills-to-Foster 3-day course which will equip you with essential skills required to care for a vulnerable child or young person. Attendance at the course forms part of the assessment process and all applicants are required to attend. 

Depending on when the training course starts, you may be invited to attend the course before the assessment begins or during the assessment.

Step 3 - Assessment (Stage 1 and 2)

Once we have completed your initial enquiry and an initial home visit has been carried out, a decision will be made to progress to Stage 1.

Both you and your allocated worker will sign an Assessment Stage 1 agreement outlining the process involved. During the Assessment Stage 1 a number of checks, required by the government under the fostering regulations, will be undertaken which includes:

  • your local authority
  • probation
  • finance
  • employment
  • education

In addition to the above, we will complete personal references and education checks for your children. You will be expected to undertake a health assessment with your doctor. We will need to complete a Disclosure and Barring Service (DBS) check on you, your partner and any members of your household who are over 18 years old.

We will also agree on a timeframe for this work to be undertaken. You will be offered the opportunity to undertake Skills-to-Foster training at this stage.

Upon completion of Assessment Stage 1, you will be allocated a social worker to carry out an assessment of your background, life experiences and the qualities you would bring to fostering.

This is called Assessment Stage 2 of the fostering process. This will be reviewed halfway through by the principal social worker within the team to check any plans that need to be put into place.

Step 4 - Approval

You will be invited to a Fostering Panel that will assess your application alongside the government fostering regulations and make a recommendation for your approval as a foster carer and the final decision will be made by the agency decision maker shortly after.

Step 5 - Post-approval

You will be enrolled on our payment system and allocated a supervising social worker who will help you prepare yourself and your home for a child or young person coming into your care, and your life as a foster  carer begins!

After one year, you will go back to a Fostering Panel which will review your first year as a foster carer.

Start today

If you would like further information, with no-obligation, please send us your details and one of our fostering team will get in touch with you.

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