OXFORD – Kryse Skye, a mother and foster mother living in Bryant Pond, is in the last year of a Master of Arts program at the University of New England. To fulfill one of its requirements, she is organizing a program for foster, adoptive and prospective foster parents to help create for them an awareness of what to expect from parenting within the foster care system.
Meant to be a grassroots support group rather than a training session set up by the Department of Human Services, she said it is organized by and for foster parents. The first meeting is set for 5 to 7 p.m. Tuesday, Aug. 19, at the Oxford Advent Christian Church on Route 26. A grant from Adoptive and Foster Families of Maine to start support groups has been helpful, Skye said, and a representative, who has a master list of foster family names, plans to be at the first meeting.
Skye said she has been approached for several years about starting a support group in the area. Two such groups exist in the state, she said, but for foster parents in Fryeburg, Harrison and beyond, the distance is daunting.
“There’s a whole lot of experience and expertise foster parents can share with each other, ” she said. “And they can help support parents who face problems with DHS and other bureaucracies involved in foster care and adoption.”
It has been her experience that foster parents don’t have a lot of clout with the system. “One reason I went back to school is to be an advocate for children,” she said.
“Children lose their basic support when they lose their families and they need an educated advocate. Foster children are so vulnerable. They need someone who can navigate the system to advocate for them.”
That’s not to say that education alone makes a good advocate. Skye said it takes a combination of caring and education and experience in working with the systems to help compensate for the child’s loss of a support system. The program will attempt to help foster parents have a unified voice in dealing with the system. There’s safety in numbers, she said.
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