In the last two years there has been a further increase to the suite of MTFC programmes with the addition of the KEEP programme; Keeping Foster and Kinship Parents Supported and Trained. The programme is designed for mainstream foster and kinship carers with children aged between five and twelve years and utilises the same principles and theoretical underpinnings of MTFC but without the whole team around the child approach.
Developed by Dr. Patricia Chamberlain and colleagues (2008) [1], KEEP is a 16 week foster carer group which aims to increase the parenting skills of foster and kinship parents, decrease the number of placement disruptions, improve child outcomes, and increase the number of positive placement changes (e.g. reunification, adoption)
Project KEEP aims to accomplish these goals by:
Promoting the idea that foster parents can serve as key agents of change for children.
Strengthening foster parent’s confidence and skills so they can change their child’s behaviors.
Helping foster parents use effective parent management strategies and provide them with support to do so.
We are now at the end of a two year pilot programme for mainstream foster and kinship carers. In England, teams who were already delivering MTFC programmes were eligible to bid to be a KEEP pilot site. The successful Local Authorities were Dudley, Hammersmith & Fulham, Oxfordshire, Solihull and West Sussex. Four of these Local Authorities have continued to run KEEP with Solihull and Dudley now having certified Group Facilitators. This means that they each had a staff member who had run 3 KEEP groups and who also met the criteria for certification with the model developers in Oregon. The 2 individuals (Emma Poole from Dudley & Yvonne Headley from Solihull), their respective employers and the MTFCE National Implementation Team are all delighted with this exciting development.
KEEP provides an important complement to the MTFC programmes and fits with the developing ideas that children in foster care present with needs which are on a continuum, and that it is possible to match their needs more effectively with a stepped approach to service provision [2].
KEEP is an evidence-based programme demonstrated to improve outcomes; specifically placement stability and behavioural and emotional improvements for children in foster and kinship care. The programme has been evaluated using a randomised trial design with 700 foster and kinship carers in San Diego, California which demonstrated post group outcomes of fewer child behaviour problems and increased rates of positive parenting methods by carers. Reunification rates were also higher and disruption rates lower compared to the control group.
The model developers are currently looking at how KEEP can be adapted to meet the needs of foster carers, kinship carers and even adoptive parents across all of the age ranges. News of these developments will appear on this web site quite soon.
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[1] Chamberlain, P., Price, J., Leve, L.D., Laurent, H., Landsverk, J.A., & Reid, J.B. (2008). Prevention of behaviour problems for children in foster care: outcomes and mediation effects. Prevention Science, 9, 17-27.
[2] Philip A Fisher, Patricia Chamberlain and Leslie D. Leve. Care Matters: Improving the lives of foster children through evidence-based interventions. Vulnerable Youth Studies. Vol.. 00, No 00, Xxxxx 2009, 1-6
