Available on CapLEARN; registration required.

Watch and discuss what you hear from firsthand accounts of resource parents sharing the impact of support and collaborative partnerships when working with children, youth, and their families. Agencies can use the videos and discussion guide to explore the impact of agency staff, peer, family, and community support structures on resource parents. 

Explore the various aspects of the importance of normalcy for children and youth in care.

Learn to facilitate a normalcy conversation and to promote normal and developmentally appropriate experiences for youth in foster care.

Examine a five-step framework that helps organizations promote youth engagement in normalcy conversations about the youth’s own care.

Exhibits the effect of committed caregivers throughout the process of foster parenting to adoption and demonstrates the power of strong families in promoting positive outcomes and permanency for children. In this video, an adoptive parent shares her reflections on her relationship with her daughter on the day of her adoption.

Highlights some of the factors that motivate caregivers to work through challenges and to provide permanency to children in foster care. In this video, a foster parent discusses lessons learned from fostering over 50 children in her home.

This video raises key motivating factors for caregivers, including the need for strong family and community support networks.

Hear a first-hand account of a kinship and adoptive mother raising her nephew, fulfilling roles as both aunt and primary caregiver.

Hear about the challenges and successes and how Donaniece is teaching her grandson the meaning of family.

Shares Molene’s story about becoming the primary caregiver for her four nieces, raising them, adopting them, negotiating the child welfare system, and creating a family.

Bruce and Brenda have been married for 33 years and have four daughters. From 2006 to 2009, they provided a kinship placement for their four grandchildren. In 2010, the couple adopted Bruce (now 18 years old), Tre’Nae (now 15 years old), Mason (now 13 years old), and Kiaunna (now 10 years old).

Learn to be more intentional about creating opportunities to relate to the staff and families you serve and to infuse more empathy into your agency.

Emphasizes the need for agency assistance and openness toward creative therapeutic services such as music lessons and highlights the need for a strong caregiver support group. This video shares one caregiver’s positive experience working with older youth with special needs in therapeutic foster care.

Addresses the importance of agency resources, such as caregiver support groups and specialized training, to equip caregivers to work successfully with children and youth who have severe therapeutic needs. This video highlights a therapeutic foster parent's belief that effective advocacy relies on agency resources and training as well as community support.

Learn strategies to address the mental health needs of children, young people, and families.