Member News: Team Fostering - How are social work caseloads established to meet the needs of foster carers?

By Patsy Wainwright, Team Manager

At Team Fostering, foster carers are allocated a designated supervising social worker once they have been approved at the agency. We will not change a carer’s social worker unless necessary, to ensure consistency and to allow the fostering family and the staff member to build a relationship and strong level of familiarity.

As an agency team we want all carers to feel that their social worker has time to support them and the children that they are looking after. The Team Managers carefully monitor how many families are allocated to each worker to make sure that caseloads do not increase to a point where support and availability offered to each family is hindered. We have systems that allow us to balance workloads between staff. As each new carer is approved we consider which office is most local to them to ensure their designated social worker is close by, and then we look at which social workers have capacity for a new family. If all members of the team are supervising the maximum number of fostering households for providing thorough support, the agency considers whether additional hours or staff are needed.

This is incredibly important to Team Fostering as we pride ourselves on our provision of direct, comprehensive support that is delivered by staff who know the families that they supervise well. In turn, this increases the stability and level of support provided to the children and young people in their care by increasing their own support and satisfaction levels. It means that if our carers are struggling, they can contact their worker and know that their issue will be dealt with promptly and professionally, in a timely but calm manner.

Team Fostering is a not-for-profit, independent fostering agency with offices across the North East, Yorkshire and East Midlands and a mission statement of ‘Putting Children’s Futures First’. We pride ourselves on offering comprehensive support, innovative training and competitive allowances, all strengthened by our not-for-profit status that allows us to invest surplus funds into the services provided.

If you’d like to speak with us about becoming a foster carer, you can reach us:
By calling 0800 292 2003
Via email at [email protected]
By submitting an online enquiry form here

Source:
https://www.teamfostering.co.uk/latest-news/how-are-social-work-caseloads-established-to-meet-the-needs-of-foster-carers/

---