Foster Parent’s Perception of the Adequacy and Effectiveness of the Foster Care Program of Norfil Foundation, Inc.

Abstract

In 1998, 33,184,718 Filipino children were below 17 years old comprising 43% of the total population. By 2010, children in this age group will comprise about 36,028,737. It is estimated that an increasing proportion of the child population needs special protection (NORFIL, Inc.). Consistent with the constitutional provision of providing the child a nearest substitute to a home (Article 3, P.D. 603), the Child Care and Placement Service, a program of the Department of Social Work and Development, was developed, among other complementary programs of the DSWD (www.dswd.gov.ph/ccps.htm). This provides alternative parental care to children whose parents are unable to provide for their basic needs, temporarily or permanently, due to problems in family relationship, illness, extreme poverty, or lack of parenting preparation aggravated by lack of family support. The proponent of the present study has already written a mini thesis under the subject Child Psychology in October 7, 2002, which is entitled, A Descriptive Study of the Programs on Child Development in Selected Temporary Shelter Homes. 1n the said study where NORFIL Foundation Inc. was included, the proponent described and explored its foster care program. Considering the worsening situation of the child population, the proponent considers it most useful to continue the study, however, now with the immediate objectives of identifying and critically assessing the effectiveness and adequacy of the program from the foster parents’ perspectives and perception and eventually identifying factors and elements necessary and vital to the development and improvement of the program. The conceptual framework has been adapted from Bonoan (2000) and shows how interpersonal relationships play a significant role in the delivery of foster care to the child. The social worker and the foster home/parents deliver the services to the child, while interacting with one another in determining the most effective and efficient way of delivering the said services to the child. The child, in turn, interacts with the foster family he/she stays with and indirectly with the social worker for his/her permanency plan. From this, it shows how significant the foster parent’s perception of the adequacy and effectiveness of the foster care program is to its success. It is through them that the services are delivered to the child, and through them that the needs, love, and care for the child are met. This paper therefore aims to answer the major problem How do the foster parents perceive the adequacy and effectiveness of the foster care program of NORFIL Foundation Inc.? The following are the sub-problems to support the main problem of the study: How do the foster parents rate the adequacy and effectiveness of the domains of recruitment, application, child specifications, matching, placement, subsidy and CCS, trainings and seminars, social worker home visits, foster parents, multiple fostering, life book, maintenance, performance of the roles of social workers and the foster care program? What are their justifications for their ratings of these domains? What suggestions and recommendations for improvement do the foster parents offer for the development of the specific domains of the program? It is assumed that the respondents are reliable and honest in their responses and provided the researcher with sufficient information to conclude the adequacy and effectiveness of the foster care program. The study will serve the interests of all the participants of the foster care program. It will provide a third-party feedback to the agency on the performance of the program; it will serve as a preliminary evaluation or validation in of the effectiveness and adequacy of the foster care program; it will also be a means of identifying, evaluating, and improving the roles social workers play in the implementation of the program; it will serve as venue for foster parents to assess the program and give their suggestions for improvement and efficient provision of foster care; it will serve as a reference and basis of the foster care agencies in the development of efficient instrument in evaluation of their respective foster care programs. Most importantly, the study wil! serve the best welfare of the children under the foster care program through the improvements of the foster care services. The study focused only on the foster parents’ perception of the adequacy and effectiveness of the foster care program of NORFIL and the performance of the role of social workers in the delivery of foster care. Since the foster parents do not take part in the permanency planning of the child through a part of the foster care program, it was not included as one of the domains in analysis of the program’s adequacy and effectiveness. Geographical representation of foster parents was not one of the considerations for sampling of respondents in the study. The use of the interview schedule was the only instrument used in the collection of data. Finally, the descriptive nature of the study only allowed for central tendency measures and qualitative analysis of the foster care program’s adequacy and effectiveness. Significant relationships among variables were not measured in this study. The descriptive research design was utilized in the study to qualitatively and quantitatively measure the adequacy and effectiveness of the foster care program of NORFIL Foundation Inc. The population of the study was the seventeen (17) licensed foster parents, all females, of the foster care program of NORFIL Foundation Inc. who reside in communities located in San Mateo and Montalban, Rizal, in Baesa and Bagong Silang, Quezon City and in Bulacan. Five or 30% of the respondents were chosen as samples and representatives of the study according to the following criteria: length of service as a foster parent (newly licensed foster parent vis-a-vis oldest licensed foster parent), number of children fostered, number of children per placement, and foster parent status (regular foster parent vis-a-vis peer supervisor). The researcher has also reached the point of saturation having encountered repetition and redundancy of the justifications for the ratings of and the suggestions for improvements on the effectiveness and adequacy of the program among the five respondents. Thus characteristics of the respondents of the study were foster parents who had their first license in 1991, 1992, 1993, 1999 and 2001, who had fostered a range of one child to four children at a time or fostered a total of seven to twenty seven children and who are peer supervisors (three or 60% of the total respondents) and regular foster parents (two or 40% of the total respondents). An interview schedule was used in the study (see Appendix B for the Interview Schedule/Kasangkapang Pangpanayam). \t was prepared both in English and Filipino languages and validated by expertise and but conducted Filipino in an informal, structured and open-ended interview. Its domains are composed of the different processes and aspects of the foster care program of NORFIL: recruitment, application, child specifications, matching, placement, subsidy and CCS, trainings and seminars, SW home visits, foster parents, multiple fostering, life book, maintenance, social worker and the program. The maintenance domain is further divided into the sub-domains of peer supervisor ratings, peer supervision and maintenance of foster families, as well as with SW home visits with sub-domains of frequency and content and purpose. For each domain and sub-domains, items for rating, justification of rating and suggestions for improvement were included (see Appendix C for the Summary of Domain Specifications). The domains and sub-domains’ rates used a scale of | to 10. Data collected were treated through the measures of central tendency (mean) and variability (range and standard deviation) (see Appendix D for the Summary of the Raw Scores, Means, Standard Deviations and Ranges of the Ratings of the Domains and Sub-Domains of the Foster Care Program). The mean was computed to arrive at the average score of a specific domain measured in the study (see Appendix C). Qualitative equivalents of the average score are defined to be highly adequate and highly effective, fairly adequate and fairly effective, not fairly adequate and not fairly effective and not adequate and not effective. The analysis of the mean was supported by the statement of the collective justifications for the rating on the adequacy and effectiveness of the specific domains and sub-domains of the foster care program and the corresponding suggestions for improvement through frequencies and percentages. The use of ranges and standard deviations was necessary to determine the dispersion and the difference of the extreme scores. The results are presented per domain of the foster care program, starting off with the domain garnering the highest average score. Justifications for the ratings of and suggestions for improvement on the adequacy and effectiveness of the foster care program are illustrated in tables. Sub-domains were available to specifically measure the adequacy and effectiveness of the domains of maintenance and SW home visits. The program domain was included in the rating of the adequacy and effectiveness to validate the computed average of all the averages of the domains of the foster care program. Based on the ratings of the domains and sub-domains and the computed rating for the foster care program, it is concluded that the foster care program of NORFIL Foundation Inc. is highly adequate and effective as per foster parents’ perception, positively answering the main problem of this study. Although the computations arrive with the conclusion that the program is highly adequate and effective, major areas of improvement are deemed significant in the determination of the qualitative adequacy and effectiveness of the program. First, recruitment is perceived to be the major means to improve the delivery of the foster care program of NORFIL. Second, communication between social workers and foster parents are seen to be significant in the achievement of the program’s adequacy and effectiveness. Finally, the trainings and seminars, monthly meetings and peer supervision are important aspects of maintaining foster families in the community. The foster care program’s adequacy and effectiveness do not solely depend on the agency and the social workers. The respondents of the study recognize and acknowledge the fact that they influence the dynamics of foster care. Their evaluation of the program’s adequacy and effectiveness did not only focus on the efficiencies and deficiencies of the agency, the program and the social workers, but also reflect their fulfillment or neglect of their roles and responsibilities. The study recommends for NORFIL’s consideration of the results and findings of this study in the development of their foster care program, extension of the results to the foster care community and foster care agencies for planning and development, consideration of the other methodologies of research in the aspects of design, sampling, instrumentation and variables, and finally suggestion of comparative analysis and evaluation of the different foster care programs of the different agencies for extensive study and research on the nature and delivery of foster care not only for the development of the foster care program itself, but also for the attainment of the quality, adequacy and effectiveness of foster care best suited for the welfare of the children.