Do you ever work with children or young people? Do you know the law about ‘private fostering’ and why it means local authorities need to know? To keep children safe we need everyone who works with children and families to help. If your role involves supporting families, you may well have come across families who…
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Our amazing ambassadors at Shine Leeds continually strive to make a difference to the community, through their work. Over the years they have found many ways to support the work of Child Friendly Leeds, including support for care leavers at Christmas, treats for children in care at Easter, regular support for local children and introductions…
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As part of National Adoption Week we’re serialising one adopters story through the adoption process. Here it’s time for panel… Part four I almost forgot Panel, that’s because it was great. I was terrified before we went in, shaking, feeling sick, the works. Don’t worry, you are in a room of positive people who really…
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As part of National Adoption Week we’re serialising one adoptive families journey through the process, today it’s ‘stage two…’ Part three ‘Stage Two’ was a much anticipated part of the adoption process and although we had some reservations we were open minded and ready for the probing and interrogation we had been warned about. One…
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As part of National Adoption Week we’re serialising one adoptive families journey through the adoption process. Here Helen talks about the first home visit. Part two Bonzo likes to bark. Bonzo likes to bark loudly. He particular likes to bark when people come to the door. Today was not a day for Bonzo to display…
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Next week is National Adoption week, so over the coming days we’ll be serialising one adoptive families journey through the process. Additionally we’ll be having a Q&A session on Twitter on 20 and 22 October using #adopt4leeds from @child_leeds and we have an event you can attend to find out more at Trinity Centre in…
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Fostering and adoption services are an integral part of Leeds City Council’s work with children and young people. Over the coming months we will be hearing from a range of people working with, and as part of, our fostering and adoption services, telling the stories of the work we do for the city’s children and…
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Today we talk to Ben Whitehead, a manager within Leeds City Council’s fostering team, about Leeds City Council’s supported lodgings initiative. The initiative provides lodgings for young people aged 16-21, and we wanted to know how this new initiative works and who can get involved and become a supported lodgings provider… Supported lodgings are a…
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My journey as a single adopter started over 2 years ago. It was a massive decision to apply to adopt, after looking into all of the other options. I did lots of background reading, and spoke to friends who had already adopted to get as much information as I could, before I applied. I was…
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Today we hear from Heather, who manages the adoption and fostering panel service at Leeds City Council. The panels are the independent groups of people who prospective adoptive parents and foster carers meet near the end of their assessment process. We started by asking her how she got into managing the service. “I’ve worked for…
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“Adopting a child is such an exciting and nerve racking experience in equal measure, but adopting siblings is a really rewarding thing to do because the children have such a special connection – they are forever linked by their shared life story. “We have 3 fantastic, amazing adopted children – siblings, aged 7, 6 and…
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Today is our final part from our gay couple, writing about their experience of becoming foster carers for Leeds City Council. We hope you’ve enjoyed it. “We had spent the last few months being assessed to become foster carers. We felt relieved and satisfied when it was all completed and submitted to the relevant people.…
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