Looking for something rewarding to do? Providing treatment foster care might be just for you
PATH Idaho cites competitive reimbursement, on-the-job training and the greatest benefit of all: Helping children with significant needs
For more information, contact
Bobbi Geiger, 208-570-5625
Martin Johncox, 208-658-9100
www.pathidaho.org
www.facebook.com/pathidaho
www.twitter.com/pathidaho
When a child cannot be placed in traditional foster care, where can they go? Treatment foster care is one option and PATH Idaho is recruiting “professional parents” in the Moscow-Coeur d’Alene area who are up to the challenge.
PATH Idaho currently provides treatment foster care to 35 children, up from three this time last year, and is now expanding into the Coeur d’Alene area and recruiting foster families.
“While treatment foster care reimburses parents more than traditional foster care, becoming a foster parent is a serious commitment and a desire to help must be the first motivation,” said Bobbi Geiger, Executive Director for PATH Idaho. “We are looking for parents who would like to put to use their experiences in working with kids.”
Children in treatment foster care have more difficult behavioral and emotional issues than typical foster kids. Typically, they have a history of abuse, running away, significant trauma and serious behavioral problems. Treatment foster parents are paid more per child than typical foster parents and treatment parents undergo more training and have more support to cope with the demands.
“The reimbursement is very good, especially compared to traditional foster care, and that certainly helps. But no amount of money is worth it, if you do it just for the money,” said Marlene Cleverley of Twin Falls, who has been a foster parent since 1980 and has a 17-year-old foster son through PATH. “You need to offer unconditional love and support, plenty of patience and good judgment in a treatment setting – and there’s no way that can just be purchased.”
PATH kids are as young as 3, but they generally tend to be adolescents because that’s when the most difficult behaviors tend to manifest themselves. Most of PATH Idaho’s children come from the Idaho Department of Health and Welfare. Prospective parents may successfully complete the training, background checks and home inspection in a couple of months.
“Statewide, we have a waiting list of 22 children and 12 in the Coeur d’Alene area,” Geiger said. “These are children who are ready to be placed in a treatment foster home and the only thing holding us back is a lack of qualified and trained parents.”
During June, Geiger is spending more time away from her Boise office for an advertising/promotional campaign, giving media interviews and holding meetings for prospective parents. Kimberly Lee, a former Children’s Mental Health Clinician with Health and Welfare, runs PATH’s Coeur d’Alene office. The next informational meeting will be held in Moscow at noon Saturday, May 21st at Best Western University Inn Centennial Room, 1516 W. Pullman Road and it includes a free lunch. A second meeting that same day will be held at the same location from 7 p.m. to 8 p.m. and includes free dessert. For more information, go to pathidaho.org or facebook.com/pathidaho.
While treatment foster care costs the state more than standard foster care, it is actually a money saver because most treatment-level children would have to be institutionalized at of cost of $100 to $300 a day.
“If not for treatment care programs like PATH, more children would be institutionalized, at a greater cost to the state and with less desirable outcomes for the children,” said Kathy James, a retired 33-year veteran of IDHW who most recently oversaw child protection programs in the Wood River and Magic valleys.
“Foster care like PATH also frees up social workers to spend more time doing mandated services, such risk assessment and working with families,” said James, who now serves on PATH Idaho’s advisory board. “In terms of foster care and child protection, its saves money to have an outside entity provide treatment foster care services.”
PATH is a private 501c(3) non-profit business that has provided treatment foster care and child and family services since 1972 and has offices in Minnesota, North Dakota and Idaho. PATH started providing services in Idaho in 2010 2009 and has opened offices in Twin Falls and, in February, Coeur d’Alene.
PATH is more selective about its parents than traditional foster programs. In addition to passing stringent background checks, PATH parents must have two years of foster care or equivalent experience or education. Typical equivalent experience would include working as a standard foster parent, teacher, day care/preschool provider, youth counselor or academic training; being a successful parent alone isn’t enough to meet the experience requirement.
PATH parents must also take 30 hours of training a year (90 in their first year) and attend regular support groups. They have access to a certified social worker 24-7 to help them. PATH parents also get 14 days of reimbursed respite a year and may occasionally provide respite care to other foster parents for additional reimbursement.
PATH offers a much higher level of support to treatment foster parents than Health and Welfare is able to. Treatment foster children typically require many meetings with probation officers, doctors, counselors, psychologists and teachers for Individualized Education Plans. Most take prescription medication and that must be monitored and recorded.
“PATH is there when I need them, sometimes to assist with transporting the kids, or to be present in counseling meetings, which can be very intense,” said Cleverly, 58, who lives with her 16-year-old son and husband as well. “The support is unbelievable and it keeps me from getting burned out.”
Cleverly said that sometimes, the PATH reimbursement goes toward taking the family to an amusement park or vacation. That’s a new experience for the foster son, who had never been much of anywhere.
Cleverley credits the intensive work and dedication of her family and PATH with helping to turn around her foster son. The foster son is diabetic and had a tendency to neglect his health, using hospitalization to manipulate situations or avoid consequences.
“He’s not doing that anymore and he is taking his medication and watching his health, so we can now deal with the lying, stealing or whatever other behaviors we need to address,” Cleverly said. “It is an amazing feeling as each one of these kids responds and start to take a healthy control of their lives because they feel genuine support and concern. There is really no more rewarding thing I can think of.”
Treatment foster parents are expected to provide a higher level of guidance to children and, when appropriate, to serve as mentors to parents, who are often dealing with addiction or other problems.
Treatment foster care, like all kinds of foster care, is intended to be temporary. If children show enough improvement, they may be reunited with their families or moved to a less-intensive, non-therapeutic home. Sometimes, family reunification is not possible and the child ages out of foster care.
“If these kids don’t turn one way, they’re going to turn the other and they may never be a part of society,” Cleverley said. “We’re here to put them on the right path.”
