Orphans into loving foster families in China

Care for Children is supporting Social Welfare Institutions (orphanages) across China to transition to community-based care.  This means expanding their services to support children and families in the surrounding communities. The first step is supporting children who have been placed in foster families, as well as those who remain in the institution. The next step is to open up their services to all children and their families in the community, particularly those who are vulnerable and at risk of being abandoned. 

Chengdu Social Welfare Institution in Sichuan Province has developed one of the best models of community-based care across China. With more and more children moved out of the institution and placed into local families, in 2011 the institution started repurposing its facilities accordingly. They have established a kindergarten within the institution with over 100 children. Not only does it provide much needed early childhood education but it also allows children within the institution to mix with children in the community.  

They have also redirected their funds and resources to build community resource centres within those communities where the majority of children have been placed. As well as a base for the family placement workers, from where they can manage their caseload of children, here children can access a variety of services such as rehabilitation, independent living classes, and special education.  

Before 2010, the institution was providing special education to roughly 20% of children with additional needs in the surrounding communities. By encouraging foster mothers to become special education teachers and forming mother-teacher teams, they are proud to report that all children with additional needs are now receiving special education.  

To support children, especially those with disabilities, into independence, the institution has also developed vocational skills training programme. They currently offer bakery training and plan to develop courses in soap making, pottery and farming. One of the former children at the institution – who went on to work for the bakery department of the Shanghai Shangri-la hotel – has even returned to help with the teaching. 

Parents also have access to training such as positive communication with children and how to care for children with disabilities. As well as improving the success of family placements, it is hoped that over time the community resource centres will result in less children being abandoned in the first place.     

Your support of Care for Children helped start all of this. Because of you, Chengdu Social Welfare Institution  was able to begin a foster care programme that both changed the lives of the children placed in foster homes and gave its staff the time and energy to create systemic change. Thank you for your generosity.

The following is another remarkable account of one of the foster parents who came to speak at our recent family placement conference in Shanghai, China.

Over the years she has fostered many children, including those with disabilities, who spent part of their childhood in an orphanage. One of whom went on to be adopted by an overseas family. She is extremely proud that he is now studying automotive mechanics in Germany.

“We have seen so much change in our children, and they have exceeded our expectations. We have received amazing support from the family placement workers helping us to care for our children in the best way.

“I have learnt so much by being a foster parent. It has inspired me to do more and I feel a great sense of achievement and joy. They receive warmth and love from their new family. I miss them very much.

“Now we have more children who are unable to go to school because of their disabilities. So we’ve developed a new education course for children who can’t attend school. We’ve witnessed amazing changes - children who couldn’t show any emotion can now express their love for you. We have opened a colourful new world of possibilities - we believe the children’s future is now full of hope because of this training program.

“I have so much love and responsibility for the children in my heart.”

Once again, thank you for your support and staying connected with our work.

In late October, Care for Children hosted a two day family placement conference in Shanghai, China. The aim of the conference was to share international best-practice in family placement for orphaned and abandoned children in Asia. We were lucky enough to have a number of foster parents speak about their experiences of fostering. Here is the remarkable account of one of them:

“Many of my friends don’t understand, they think I’m stupid. I disagree. My neighbours, who are also foster carers, we together provide a home and this kind of love has filled every corner of our village.

“Li Wei* was very ill - often it took half a day to take him to hospital. It was so difficult. My husband and I lost our initial excitement of fostering but the incredible support of the (orphanage) staff kept us going. They visited two or three times a week and took a lot of the pressure off us. Since then Li Wei has learnt to walk, read and eat all on his own.

“We go to the park and Li Wei dances when he hears music. He loves to dance. He’s part of our family now. One day when I was feeding him egg he shouted ‘Mum, Mum’. This was the first time he had called me his mum.

“Zhang Min also joined us to be a sister to Li Wei. They’ve been with us for three years and now our house is filled with love and laughter because of them. Our family is more happy because of them. My heart is filled with happiness when they hug and kiss me. It’s normal to love our own baby. But to love someone else’s baby takes courage as well.

“I’ve had bad moments, I’ve shed tears, but because of Li Wei and Zhang Min I want to give them the warmth of a home. My life is much richer than before because of my experience of foster care. We’ll keep doing this so that more and more children can have an opportunity to have a better life.”

Once again, thank you for your support and staying connected with our work.

* All names have been chnaged to protect anonymity.

Here is an account from one of the members of our China training team, detailing one of their first foster family visits.

“Recently our Training Team visited one of Care for Children's oldest and most established foster care projects in China. As it was my first visit, I was eagerly anticipating what I would find. We spent one day checking in with some of the project's foster families. 

“One of the families we visited had fostered two children, a girl and a boy. I really enjoyed talking to the teenage girl, Dan Dan. A girl of only 17, she was quite shy but gradually opened up to us as we asked her about what she was doing. Her hands were busy stitching and we found out that Dan Dan had a keen eye for cross-stitch and design. She clearly had a skill and her foster mum recognised this and how much joy it brought her.  

“Her foster mum was really proud of her. She explained she had encouraged Dan Dan's talent by investing in some cross-stitch design kits with various patterns. This had really fuelled her interest. She really enjoyed sitting with her foster mum and talking about her designs, and her foster mum painstakingly unpicked any wrong stitches or mistakes. Her patience and love for her foster daughter was so evident, and she proudly displayed Dan Dan's work around the room for everyone to see. 

“The foster family had become a place where Dan Dan could meaningfully contribute to her home, put her own special mark on it and be reminded every day that she belongs. 

“That's what I love about foster families: the attention to detail and the sensitivity of care that can be offered. That's why I love visiting the families Care for Children works with and seeing the small things that make a huge difference to a child's life. And that's why your support, no matter how large or small makes a real difference.”

Thank you for your support and staying connected with our work.

The challenge of changing a system that affects the lives of hundreds of thousands of children can feel overwhelming. But the progress China has made in the way they care for their orphaned and abandoned children proves that it is possible.

Every Care for Children project follows four key stages, which ensures sustainability, local ownership and impact, culminating in the government taking full ownership of the project.

Each project has a “Pilot” stage, where Care for Children will partner with one or two care institutions (orphanages), learning about their needs and developing a training curriculum. In China, we began this stage with the Shanghai Civil Affairs Bureau, and quickly replicated it with other orphanages around the country.

The second stage is the “National Roll-Out,” when we are able to scale up rapidly across a project area. Once we have secured buy-in from the top levels of government, our team of social work experts re-train staff from government-run orphanages as family placement workers. We empower the staff to recruit, assess and train suitable foster families, as well as place, support and monitor children as they move from the orphanage into families for the long-term.

Our long-term goal is that Care for Children is no longer needed in our project areas. We spend the third stage of our projects “Preparing for Independence,” so that we can responsibly reach stage four, our “Exit” from the project areas.

China is too large for our team to train all orphanages, so, for stage three of this project, Care for Children is working to build the capacity of five strategically located orphanages across the country. The aim is to develop these sites into best practice examples of family placement and community-based care, as well as training hubs for their own regions. By the end of this stage, local experts at all five institutions will have the capacity to train, support and inspire other orphanages, gradually reducing reliance on Care for Children.

This model is sustainable because of the buy-in of local governments, institutions and individuals. In China, Care for Children has seen dedicated people step up across the country to make sure that the change we are seeing is going to affect Chinese children for decades to come.

Your support makes all of this possible. Thank you!