Indiana Foster Care and Adoption Association

Available courses

• Parenting Children of Different Ethnic and Religious Backgrounds

  • Teacher: Ray Hoskins
  • Teacher: Christina Morrison

  Foster parents need to be prepared to work with children from different cultures, and this frequently leads to foster families bonding with, and wanting to adopt young people from other religious and/or cultural backgrounds.  This course offers some issues and strategies to help with the complexities of the process of parenting young people from different backgrounds.

  

• Preparing for the Transition from Foster Youth to Adoption

  • Teacher: Christina Morrison
  • Teacher: Ray Hoskins

  Under most circumstances, young people enter foster care having an initial goal of reunification with their biological family.  At some point, they might enter out of home care, either in a congregate care facility, kinship care placement, or foster home.  These settings, at least until parental rights are terminated, are considered temporary placements.  Once parental rights are terminated, permanence becomes the default goal.  That means young people start facing the possibility of becoming someone’s adoptive child.  This course focuses on preparing young people for the process of becoming adopted.

  

• Understanding the Dynamics of Kinship Care

  • Teacher: Christina Morrison
  • Teacher: Ray Hoskins

  Kinship care, the placement of children from the child welfare system in your state with members of their biological family is growing.  Is is growing for several good reasons.  The simplest reason is that it is most often in the best interest of the children involved.

  This workshop explains the reasons, benefits, and cautions families need to consider when facing the prospects of kinship care.

  

• Caring for Children with Complex Behavioral Issues

  • Teacher: Christina Morrison
  • Teacher: Ray Hoskins

  There are few things more heartbreaking for all involved than fostering a child, or accepting a child in pre-adoptive placement, growing to love the child, perhaps even adopting the child and then having the relationship disrupt.  This course is designed to give you an overview of the kinds of issues foster and adoptive parents often face, the disruptive potential, and developing realistic expectations and strategies for preventing disruption.

  

• Introduction to Social Media for Foster and Adoptive Parents

  • Teacher: Bryan Anderson

  This short course is designed to help foster and adoptive parents navigate the world of social media, including facebook, myspace and other sites, understand the benefits and risks, and address privacy issues.

  Social media are major parts of the lives of many people in the world now,and it is important that foster and adoptive families can successfully navigate these sites.

  

• Introduction to Internet Safety for You and Your Family

  • Teacher: Bryan Anderson

  This short course offers an overview of the steps you need to take to keep yourself and your family safe while using the internet.  It covers general best practices, and suggestions for tools to use to keep your information safe, and your family protected.

  

• Understanding Indiana Adoption Subsidies

  • Teacher: Christina Morrison

  In this course, a recorded webinar by Josh Kroll of NACAC, you will receive an overview of the law regarding adoption subsidies, how that law is being interpreted in Indiana and suggestions regarding negotiating appropriate subsidies if you are adopting in the state.