Friday, September 26, 2014

Foster Kids - Foster Care Activities and Progress Report



There's something exciting about getting a progress report. Sure, there are the low points and areas that can be improved, but the best part is seeing where you are doing really well. So with the 2014 third quarter coming to an end, I thought it'd be good to let you see our progress report because many people like to hear good news about foster children. Our success means more kids are moving out of the foster care system and into forever homes.


Fifty-five percent of our time is spent on doing research, international communication, documentation and follow up on active foster child cases. We spend 30% of our time answering inquiries from agencies across the country and working to bring agencies on board so they can start sending us their foster children cases.

Working with county agencies involves a lot of documentation, and preparations can take months before we get their first case. The remaining 15% of our time and energy is spent on marketing, fund raising and administration. Every week we get calls and emails from agencies saying that they just heard about us.


We're in our second year of offering our services pro bono (free) to foster care agencies and non-profits. You may wonder why we offer our services pro bono. Before 2013, when we would get a call from a foster care agency, we would explain our research services along with the cost for our international work. The cost was less than $40 which does not cover the expenses to handle a foster youth case. Yet many agencies often said they didn't have a budget to pay that amount.





Our mission is to make a lasting, positive impact on the lives of foster children and allowing $40 to be a roadblock to helping a foster child isn't acceptable. Therefore in 2013, our organization launched a new program so that foster care agencies could and do get our services for free. Guess what happened? We doubled our case load last year. Guess what’s happening this year? You got it. We have already doubled our caseload and will probably triple it.


Bottom line: many more foster kids are moving out of foster care into forever homes usually with relatives in the U.S. or adoptive foster parents.


How are we doing concerning our caseload? It all depends. Every case is different. We have to point out that we can and do locate family members in just a couple of weeks. Unfortunately, several weeks to a couple of months can often go by while case workers get back to us with their results from our findings. Sometimes, our first effort is successful. Other times we have to launch a new search effort before we find a foster child's relatives.




Presently we have eight active cases. Each case involves three to five people. Our cases average between two to three months. It takes many weeks of time and effort when we have a case where a foster kid's only known relatives live in the mountains with no Internet, telephone or cell reception.


We are fast approaching the tipping point for our organization. We have multiple cases from several states with more agencies finalizing details so they can start sending us their cases. County officials are talking with neighboring counties that have already used our services. We've handled cases in seven states and expect Arizona to be number eight by October.

On the donor side, let's just say that an increase in contributions and volunteers would be outstanding. Supporters are the life blood of our organization and allow us to continue to offer our services pro bono to county agencies.


We are gearing up to launch a crowdfunding project in November. Gia Heller, social media marketing guru, has already offered to support our project. Others such as Star Devi with Spin Digital Publishing have also offered to help us. There are many ways that you, too, can participate and help a foster child.






As anyone in business knows, no matter what your day-to-day activities are, you still have to look at the numbers if you want to survive and thrive. Our goal is to make a lasting change for at least 200 foster youth in 2015. That will require a budget of $100,000. We're very optimistic that when New Year's comes around, we'll be poised to succeed.


Be a part of the solution and volunteer to help get more foster kids into forever homes.

Regards,

Richard Villasana
  Richard

Richard Villasana
Find Families In Mexico
760-690-3995

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2 comments :

  1. Richard thanks for the mention in your blog. It is our pleasure to help kids find "Forever Homes" (which I think may be a good title for your crowd funding campaign.

    ReplyDelete