When you suggest that it might be possible to move towards family-based care by reuniting children with their families or by finding foster families for them, it is not uncommon to be told that this is not possible with ‘those’ children. Or sometimes, people will tell you that they have tried to convince families to take back their children or have tried to recruit foster families, and no one was willing. In a way, these nay-sayers are right, because it is not that easy, but it is possible.
A lot of children in institutions are there because of the prejudices that exist about them in their society. This may be because they have disabilities, because they are HIV affected, because they are part of a minority ethnic group or religion, or because of any number of other reasons.
When there are strong prejudices against children, for whatever reason, the community is likely to be very resistant to allowing those children to rejoin them, initially. This is something that cannot be overcome by simply asking them to accept the children. For successful reintegration of the children into that community, it is essential to start the process of transforming care with an information and awareness campaign.
Before you ever suggest that you are thinking about finding families for the children, you have to start an information campaign that in a general way addresses the prejudices and stigmas that exist and that stand in the way of acceptance of the children. This includes both dispelling stigmas through spreading correct information, and raising awareness of the harm done by institutionalisation and of the benefits of family-based care for children.
What kind of information campaign will be most effective, will be dependent on what local people are most connected with by way of getting their information. This is something that needs to be researched and tested. Examples of what can be used are: using newspapers, radio, television, banners, pamphlets, street plays, but also involving local community and religious leaders to get them to help you spread information.
Raising awareness and busting stigmas is essential to prepare the ground for introducing the idea of moving towards family-based care, and getting the community’s support. And if done well, the results can be quite astonishing. Where just a few weeks or months prior everyone would have been opposed to the idea of allowing ‘those’ children to live within the community, you may now have people queueing to sign up as potential foster parents.
Not easy to do, but it has been achieved repeatedly in many different places. So you can make it happen too.
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