A little goes a long way in India
Key Assets Australia (http://www.keyassets.com.au/) is part of the Core Assets Group (http://www.coreassets.com) an international organisation which provides an extensive portfolio of social care services including foster care, for children and young people. The founder led Core Assets was established in 1994 by Social Worker Jim Cockburn and foster carer Jan Rees, who formed a unique vision of delivering high quality care in a family setting through an unparalleled level of holistic support services and intensive training delivered to the carer and the child. This new approach to foster care, Team Parenting™, has gone on to deliver a positive and lasting difference to children and young people in four continents.
Core Assets' journey in India started when we met up with Ian Anand Forber Pratt (http://www.cerikids.org/who-we-are/meet-ceri-staff/ian-anand-forber-pratt). Abandoned as a baby in Calcutta Ian was adopted at two months old and grew up in the US with a loving family. As a qualified social worker with experience in foster care, in 2011 he returned to India with a mission to develop foster care in the country. At that time, in a country of over 1.2 billion people, there was no formal system for foster care, and it was estimated that over 25 million children were orphaned. (UNICEF 2007) Having settled in Udaipur in the state of Rajasthan, Ian was facing a state government reluctant to consider developing foster care, a total lack of awareness of what foster care is, and a tradition of children being placed in institutional care – often under-funded and over-crowded.
Jim Cockburn and Estella Abraham were introduced to Ian in 2012 and heard of Ian’s struggles, and with funding and support from Jim, and project funding from UNICEF (https://www.unicef.org/) , Ian was able to develop a small charity, Foster Care India (http://fostercareindia.org/) – aiming to raise awareness of foster care in the local community, support local families with accessing resources and education, recruiting foster carers and placing children. Core Assets in 2014 funded a project development worker based in Udaipur to share Core Assets expertise in foster care and adapt it to the Indian context.
Rajasthan with support from Ian was one of the first states to develop Legal Guidelines for foster care in 2015. Soon afterwards Ian was invited to join a National working group developing Model Guidelines for Foster Care 2015 (http://www.bettercarenetwork.org/library/the-continuum-of-care/foster-care/model-guidelines-for-foster-care-2015-india) for the whole country, adapting many of Core Assets policies along the way.
The team in Udaipur started to recruit, assess, train and support foster carers and were able to place four children. The hurdles that had to be overcome in the local community and state systems were immense and institutions were slow to respond or reluctant to lose their children. Many of the couples were childless and some had applied to adopt but not had any children placed. They were delighted to have their dreams fulfilled and to be able to give the young children a chance to live in a family.
Proud of the embryonic success in Rajasthan we soon realised that to take foster care development to the next level we needed a different strategy. The Government had published the Model Guidelines for foster care but very few people in India know what foster care is, let alone how to create a foster care system at a state level. With an estimated 25 million orphans, plus more children abandoned or on the streets we knew we had to dedicate resources to working with national and state government, and child care professionals, to reach more people in order to place more children.
In April 2016 we launched our 'Centre for Excellence in Alternative Care’ (CEAC) (http://www.alternativecareindia.org/) in New Delhi to be close to Central Government and the Ministry of Women and Child Development. Vasundhra as Centre Director and Managing Trustee is funded via Core Assets and Ian’s new role as CEAC programme director is funded by CERI (Children’s Emergency Relief International) (http://www.cerikids.org/) in the US. Other partners have come on board to support, - e.g. the Brown School of Social Work at Washington University.
The aim of the centre is to ‘Build Safer Stronger Families for Children’ through a range of family supports, and to create quality foster care systems in every state of India.
The centre aims to work together with a wide range of agencies to build the capacity for family support in the community, kinship care and foster care development. We continue to support and mentor the Directors in their initiatives to raise awareness, research the needs of children, develop resources, training, consultation and projects to skill up states all over India. Six months into the centre launch they have already been asked by a number of states to deliver training.
To get this training off the ground we need money. CEAC are putting together a project plan and training pack to train governments and agencies to develop their own fostering services. They aim to start this off in three states of India. If we can raise £75,000 ($100 000 AUD) by end of April 2017 we will have enough to employ a team of four staff to deliver training, provide advice and support to enable these states to really get fostering off the ground over the next three years.
All donations and funds raised will be held in an account held by Key Assets and transferred to CEAC. Unfortunately as funds will be leaving your country it is unlikely that tax relief will be available, but you can be assured that every pound, dollar, yen, euro you raise will reach India and be used for the purpose intended. Office managers in each region will be asked to collect and bank funds raised, provide receipts if required. A separate bank account will be set up in the UK for the collection of funds, details will follow. In non-UK companies there will be a budget code set up in company accounts. Core Assets will transfer funds to India and each company will keep a running record of all funds raised.
Help Key Assets to make a difference for children in India by contributing to our fundraising target of $50 000 in Australia. Thank you for helping make a little go a long way :)
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