num_pages: 195
description: Growing up in placement takes a toll not just on the children and adolescents but also on the professionals charged with their care. Judges policymakers administrators probation officers psychiatrists psychologists counselors caseworkers social workers foster parents house parents guardian ad litem CASA volunteers child welfare advocates educators and program staff make critical decisions that can affect a child s life forever. The more attuned they are to what helps or hinders the development of these vulnerable young people the more likely they are to make the appropriate decisions required to promote positive placement experiences and healthy adult outcomes. The purpose of this book is to provide child welfare professionals insightful feedback from former clients who grew up in juvenile justice foster care orphanage adoptive and mental health placements. What makes this book particularly instructive derives from the authors credentials. They are college-educated adults who masterfully intertwine their childhood stories with mature perspective and their own professional expertise. The other audiences this book hopes to reach include youth in placement and students who plan on entering careers in child welfare. Children currently in care need to know that others have experienced childhoods as bad as or worse than their own that they survived and how they did it. Students preparing to work with troubled or dependent young people should learn about a side of life they probably have not experienced before they make decisions that may adversely affect these at risk youth. Sometimes a wide abyss separates theory and reality.
language: English
title: Growing Up in the Care of Strangers: The Experiences, Insights and Recommendations of Eleven Former Foster Kids
publisher: None