Fostering in Luton.
Foster carer careers.
Have you ever thought about a rewarding career as a foster carer? Would you like to make a difference in someone’s life? Is this the moment you decide to take the first step?
Simply Fostering has been requisitioned by a number of its fostering recruitment members, which includes independent fostering agencies both large and small, to recruit potential foster carer applicants, as part of the recent Bedfordshire tender.
Luton Borough is a Bedfordshire unitary authority included within the tender, along with Central Bedfordshire and Bedfordshire Borough Council. The three unitary authorities have joined under the one umbrella tender process, as a means to securing the best and most cost-effective way of securing independent fostering agency resources, mainly being foster carers to place their ‘Looked after Children’.
Local ethnic makeup reflects the need to encourage a diverse pool of foster carers.
54.6% White | 29.9% Asian | 9.8% Black | 4.2% Mixed Race | 1.5% Other
Source: 2011 Census, Office for National Statistics licensed under the Open Government Licence v.1.0 (c) Crown Copyright
Simply Fostering provides the only qualified, independent support information and free agency matching service to people interested in foster caring in the UK.
We have been helping to reduce the confusion and stress by matching people’s skills and experience with the right fostering agencies since 2005 and have helped over a thousand potential foster carers to start their fostering careers.
We provide comprehensive information about foster care and free matching service to reduce the risk of you choosing the wrong fostering agency.
The challenges of Fostering
Fostering in Luton is different from how it used to be and it’s now looked upon as a profession, where foster carers are now considered as fellow professionals to the social workers, therapists, and health workers.
Fostering is different from any other job, in that it is performed within the family home, impacts every member of the household, and involves considerable time, energy, and emotional commitment. It is therefore of concern that in some surveys approximately 28 percent of foster households report feeling stressed by fostering.
The impact of this stress cannot be confined to one aspect of life, in the same way, that other job-related stress can be managed. It is therefore important to relieve the stress of foster carers in order to ensure it does not impact the quality of care they are able to offer to children looked after or contribute to burn-out or withdrawal from the service.
There are a number of potential sources of stress in fostering, and foster carers indicate that working with social workers and teachers, and managing children’s behaviour, are all stressful at times. A potential cause of stress and disappointment for 11 percent of foster carers is the sense of frustration that arises in caring for some fostered children for whom their efforts made little difference.
Luton Borough Council
As with most local authorities around the UK, Luton Borough Council is under immense pressure to find fostering families in and around Luton and Bedfordshire, to place the majority of their children near to home.
Luton Borough Councils’ latest Ofsted report from 2016, provides information on the real difficulties Luton is experiencing in managing children’s services under pressure. Please find useful information below, which you are able to see leads to the high need for foster carers based in and around Luton.
• November 2015, nearly 2000 children and young people have been identified to receive specialist Children’s services.
• 388 children are being looked after
• 181 children live outside the local authority area
• 24 live in residential homes
• 7 live in special residential schools
• 290 live with foster families
Rewards of Fostering in Luton
Independent Fostering agency carers in and around Luton are rewarded financially for the care they provide for vulnerable, neglected and abused children and young people. The days of volunteering as foster carers are well behind us now and foster carers can be paid a professional allowance of up to £550.00 per week for a child with special and complex needs, going down to about £390.00 per week for a standard type of foster placement, meaning a child without special needs.
Foster carers speak of the rewards in seeing a child develop positively, a child smiling and laughing and actually beginning to enjoy life, as being some of the most rewarding aspects of fostering.
Foster carers come from all types of backgrounds couples, single carers, straight, gay, professional, non-professional, older, and younger people, but what they all have in common is a commitment to children and young people and they want to make a difference.
Please consider fostering in Luton and Bedfordshire today.
Finding fostering agencies.
One of our social work experts will match you and your situation with the most suitable fostering agencies in Luton, on our UK Independent Agency Database.
Different types of fostering, allowance, pay, babies, children, advice?
Just like people, Fostering Agencies are not all the same. They have different support, allowances, quality of training, and access to respite care and support groups. Not all agencies foster babies, some prefer to look after teenagers, some agencies expect you to be at home full time, others are happy if you have another job.
Let us help you find you a suitable fostering agency in the Luton area
To find out more and to take the next step towards a career as a foster carer, use our no obligation, free agency matching service by completing our fostering eligibility quiz, and get fostering right the first time!
