At fostering at modus, we believe that the level of support we provide to our carers is second to none. Our skilled and experienced social work staff can be relied upon to support you with advice, emotional support and practical guidance through those difficult times.

Our social work staff hold small caseloads which means that we can provide the optimum support available to our families. You will receive monthly formal supervision sessions during which you will be able to discuss any issues with your supervising worker and this will also give us the opportunity to provide you with feedback regarding your personal development.

A family support worker will also visit you and the child or children placed with you at least once a month. They will be able to offer practical advice and guidance to you whilst giving the young person the opportunity to talk to someone outside of their home environment.

Further visits will take place based on what you need and you will always have a modus social worker to accompany you to meetings and other appointments when necessary.

The key to successful support is in the relationship that you will develop with your supervising worker. The social work team are energetic and friendly and are very reliable to be called upon in a crisis. modus operates an ‘out of hours’ service, 24 hours a day, seven days a week so if you ever have a problem there will be somebody to call and somebody to visit if necessary.

Fostering at modus take great care in matching the right children with the right families. Whilst a perfect match is not always possible, we will always have both your family’s and the child’s needs at the forefront of our minds when considering a potential placement. This is of particular importance as a good match bodes well for a successful placement.

Our carers also receive a financial reward for looking after children. You will receive a generous weekly allowance for the child (which not only covers clothes, food, activities etc. but also encompasses a good contribution to the weekly costs of running the household). Furthermore, you will receive a healthy reward element each week which represents a ‘Thank You’ for looking after the child.

At modus, we value the importance of foster carers’ development as we believe that a key element of offering a good service to children is challenging foster carers to develop their knowledge base and skills. Whilst experience is one way of enhancing your development, training is another.

modus operates a rolling training programme that is individually tailored to each carer’s development needs.

For new and potential carers, we have a course comprising of six short sessions which will introduce you to the basics of fostering. This will also give you a chance to meet our social work staff and other new carers and get a taste as to whether fostering is for you. As part of this training, you will hear from one of our experienced carers who can talk you through their own journey.

Once approved as foster carers, the opportunities for training and development are plentiful. It is a requirement that you attend five mandatory courses on an annual basis – these cover the key elements of foster care.

After that, your training programme will be tailored to your needs. We run a two tier training system so that for those carers who are motivated and interested in pushing themselves further, they can access ‘advanced’ level courses. There is a good variety of training on offer and training is made as much fun as possible and also gives you an opportunity to meet with other carers and share your experiences.

We encourage all our family carers to embark upon the NVQ Level 3 Health and Social Care (related specifically to working with children and young people) within twelve months of being approved as carers. The NVQ comprises topics such as Child Protection, Care Planning, Working with Challenging Behaviour and more. The NVQ is a work based qualification that is transferable across many elements of Social Care. The NVQ recognises development in practical ability and encourages good practice.

modus has accreditation by City & Guilds to deliver NVQ training. We also offer a new award in Safeguarding.