Fostering with us

Children and young people are placed with Outlook Fostering by various Local Authorities across the South East of England areas and through robust matching we aim to find the right family for each child, teenager, sibling group, Parent & Child or Unaccompanied Asylum seeking children. Our children have diverse emotional and physical needs; therefore, our role is to recruit, assess, train, support and supervise foster carers so that they are able to provide effective care and support to meet those needs.

We are currently looking for new and existing foster carers in the Kent and Essex regions. We welcome interest from all kinds of people who may be single, married, in a relationship, LGBT and either own or rent their home which will have at least one spare bedroom. What matters is that you have the desire to care for a vulnerable child or young person. Carers are needed from all backgrounds, ethnicities and religions in order to provide choice of placement for children in care and with our robust matching process we ensure that families are able to meet the individual needs of a child in care.

Our team consists of professionally qualified, highly experienced social workers and administrators, supported by independent social workers and outreach staff, who are all appropriately qualified and supervised. External consultants are employed as required to provide any specialist advice and support to staff and carers.

So what makes Outlook Fostering stand out from other providers and Local Authority? It’s all about our approach, listening to the child’s voice and working together for the best outcomes for that child or young person. Our dedicated staff and carers have a great relationship and in caring for our team we care better for our children and young people.

There aren’t many jobs that are more challenging and rewarding than becoming a foster carer. The role can be difficult, but it comes with an immense amount of job satisfaction, because you have the unique opportunity to make a real and lasting difference to the lives of vulnerable children and young people.

In your care, we want a child to stabilise, grow and thrive. Whether it’s a short or long-term placement, you can help a young person through a difficult period in their life by providing them with a safe, nurturing environment and a family setting in which they can grow in confidence and self-esteem.

Recognition of the vital care you provide, fostering not only comes with emotional rewards, but financial benefits too.

Could this be you? For more information, please contact us at [email protected] or call us on 0333 800 3000.

There has been a significant increase in requests for foster homes in the last year for children and young people from birth to 18yrs of age. They need a variety of placements i.e. short term, long term, emergency, respite sibling groups or parent & child, therefore we need to recruit foster carers with this in mind.

Sometimes younger children are referred to us, particularly when there are two or three siblings who need to be placed together.

There are all sorts of reasons why children and young people need to live with our foster carers. Sometimes their parents' difficulties have been so great that they are unable to look after their children until they have resolved their issues. These problems may be due to illness, bereavement, relationship difficulties, mental health problems or addiction to alcohol and drugs. Alternatively, the child may not be able to live with their family because of the risk to their safety from somebody there. They may have suffered abuse.

Every child is different and their circumstances are never the same. However, we can say that these experiences will have affected every young person in some way, and some more than others. These effects will often be reflected in their behaviour; they will often find it hard to trust adults and will rarely have stopped all contact with their family. This is the challenge for our carers – to care for someone else's child as they would their own.

All foster carers have a supervising social worker who is dedicated to support and supervise you whilst fostering, they will visit your home once a month or more if needed. In addition, there is always a supervising social worker on Out of Hours duty 24 hours a day, every day of the year; advice and support is always available to our Outlook carers.

Outlook Fostering provides regular foster carer training, this is a place to talk to other carers, our staff team and to meet your Team Manager who will completely understand the needs of the children you'll look after. This isn't just theory; our training is designed to give the practical guidance, tools and resources you will need to provide a child or young person with a safe, loving environment.

Our Foster Carer Support Groups are there for your added support. All Outlook foster carers are provided with FREE varied and interesting training to develop your skills as a foster carer.

We want you to succeed as foster carers so when you need that extra bit of support whether it’s training, friendly advice 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, additional family support work or Theraplay sessions, we are here for you.

Becoming a foster carer is potentially a life changing decision and we believe foster carers should be financially stable in order to support the children they care for. Our carers receive a competitive children allowance and professional fee per week for each child in placement.

Outlook Foster Carers receive between £350 and £400 per week per child placed with them, depending on the child's age. Outlook Fostering is a learning organisation, recognising the importance of training, developing and supporting its foster carers.

To reflect this, expenses are paid to foster carers which is intended to cover the cost of travel to and from training and support groups.

Foster Talk membership – FREE to all Outlook Foster Carers.

In addition, there are generous tax allowances available to all foster carers, irrespective of the agency or Local Authority they may choose. Further details are given to all of our applicants but can also be obtained from the HM Revenue and Customs website. As a general guide, anyone fostering one child throughout the whole year and receiving the payments outlined above will not be liable to pay any tax. For more information, please visit www.hmrc.gov.uk

So what happens when you go forward to be assessed to foster?

The process, on average, can take between 4-6 months and involves three main tasks:

Firstly, we invite you to attend our ‘Skills to Foster’ training course, which has been designed to provide you with in-depth information about the task of fostering. The three days’ course is mandatory and will give you an overview of the fostering role, opportunity to meet the Outlook team and to talk to an existing foster carer.

Secondly, following your completion of an application form, we will carry out extensive checks. These will include work references, personal references, a medical, Disclosure Barring Checks (criminal reference check), inquiries with all Local Authorities in whose area you have lived and others. It’s here that you will meet and start to work with our Business Development Co-ordinator and have support from our dedicated administration team.

In preparation for the next stage we ask you to complete some homework such as family tree’s & Ecomap (support networks map), these are really simple to complete and we even have a template to help you.

Finally, we will allocate a qualified Social Worker to carry out an assessment of your potential ability to care for someone else's child. This assessment will involve about 10 visits (depending on your family circumstances) and will result in a written report called a Form F Assessment.

You will then be asked to attend our fostering panel, where the report will be presented for their consideration and recommendations. Once our Agency Decision Maker has signed off your approval, our induction sessions commence, which will prepare you further for the role where you will meet key members of our team.

You are now ready to start your incredible journey as a foster carer.

Outlook Fostering welcomes the transfer of experienced foster carers into the agency. We recognise and value their skills and experience, and ensure that the reassessment process – which is a statutory requirement – is completed in a manner in which reflects their experience.

However, we do prefer all new foster carers to attend our Skills to Foster course, which contains new information and facilitates a refresher on the way Outlook works within its statutory boundaries.

We are currently looking for Foster Carers. To enquire about joining our team, please fill in the fields below.