Newcomer Foster Parents

Newcomer Foster Parent Trainings

Welcome newly licensed families! We are excited to be with you on this foster care journey. Here you’ll find links to training materials you’ll need to complete in your first three months post-licensure. Over our 20 year history, these training topics are ones that we have found to be invaluable for new foster parents.

Newcomer Series Training Content

Typically, the Newcomer Series (Support Group 101, Resilience and Coping Skills, and Seven Secrets of Successful Foster Parenting) are completed during Newcomer Support Group, however, due to COVID-19 these trainings are take-home trainings and Support Group is a one hour virtual meeting.

Register for your Newcomer Support Group on the Newcomer Foster Parent Facebook Group. (DEN and SLV families, Newcomer group is in addition to your regional group. You’ll attend Newcomer as well for the first three months so that you can meet other foster parents all over Colorado.)

Please complete these trainings in order, at the rate of one per month, unless otherwise assigned.

Support Group 101

A crucial part of being a licensed foster parent at Hope & Home is attending Support Group. When the journey is easy, Support Group may seem unnecessary, but when the going gets tough, we hear time and time again that Support Group was the one place where other people understood what they were going through. These are a few Support Group “basics.”

Resilience and Coping Skills

Foster parenting is tough, but it doesn’t have to be burdensome. Foster parents who succeed understand what it means to develop resilience and healthy coping skills in the midst of the turbulence of foster care.

Seven Secrets to Successful Foster Parenting

This training sums it all up! When you move on to the Fellowship group of foster parents, be sure to keep these seven things in mind.

Safety Series

This Safety Series is a three-part series. Read through each of the sections below and complete a quiz for each. Once completed, your Home Supervisor will review the quizzes and this content with you at a home visit. After this review is complete, they will generate a certificate that is worth three hours of ongoing training credit.

Complete these trainings at your own pace. They can be completed any time in your first three months post-licensure, however, you cannot graduate until all three are completed.

Part A – Water Safety

Kids entering your home may not know how to swim, even if they are of an age where having this skill is the norm. Keeping our kids safe around water is very important as foster parents.

Part B – Safe Sleep

This is a required training for all Hope & Home families. Even if you plan on only fostering teens, you may do respite for another family with little kids or expand your age range to keep a sibling group together.

Part C – Car Seat Safety

Even if you are not planning on fostering little kids, this is a required training. You may end up transporting a younger child, or may even do respite for another family with little kids. Car seats aren’t just for babies! Kids need to be in a car seat or booster seat until they are 57″ tall.

Additional Required Trainings

Complete these trainings at your own pace. They can be completed any time in your first three months post-licensure, however, you cannot graduate until all three are completed. You have likely already completed Checkpoints as a part of the licensing process.

Indian Child Welfare Act (ICWA)

Hope & Home is a NICWA (National Indian Child Welfare Association) foster care agency. As such, this training is required for all first-year foster parents. You may have already completed a different version of this training through NICWA – if you did that training you do not need to complete this training. Please note: If you receive a placement of a child with an ICWA case, you may be required to complete additional training around this topic.

Checkpoints

Checkpoints is a very comprehensive overview of foster care basics. You should have completed this before your Interpretive Hour, but this is a great resource guide to refer back to once you’re licensed too!

Checkpoints Study Guide

In order to graduate from Newcomer to Fellowship, you need to complete all of the trainings listed above and attend Newcomer Support Group a minimum of three times.

If you have any questions, contact the following staff members who are more than happy to help you out!

In Colorado Springs, contact Amy at [email protected]

In Denver, contact Spencer at [email protected]

In the San Luis Valley, contact Annie at [email protected]