Foster Parent Certification
Harmony’s Foster Parent Certifier team tracks and provides support to help foster parents through the approval process to become foster parents for the Department of Children’s Services. They contact potential foster parents within 1 business day of receiving leads from Every Child Tennessee. They complete the prescreening and enrolled foster parents in TN-KEY. After enrolling in TN-KEY, they contact the potential family monthly to check on the progress of their training and home study.
Foster Parent Training
An intensive education course designed to orient prospective foster and kinship parents to the needs of children who are cared for in the child welfare system.
Harmony Family Center offers classes to families who are interested in these roles through a partnership with Tennessee’s Department of Children’s Services.
Foster Parent Training is based on the belief that children grow and develop better in families, where they can build safe and trusting relationships. Foster Parent Training classes serve as a guide for the participants to understand the complexities of the child welfare system and ways that they and the system can support children and families. It also provides opportunities for participants to assess their own strengths and resources in order to determine whether they are ready to take on the role of becoming foster or kinship parents. Most importantly, it helps the participants to understand the unique needs of children who have lived through the trauma of abusive, neglectful, and/or chaotic living situations and how to provide healing environments and relationships for them.
Those interested in starting the process to become a Tennessee DCS foster parent should visit the link below:
https://www.tn.gov/dcs/program-areas/training/fpt/potential.html
Home Study
Harmony receives referrals from the Department of Children’s Services to complete home studies for traditional, ICPC, and kinship foster families across the state of Tennessee. Families must be enrolled in a TN-KEY training class and complete necessary background checks before the study begins. Home Study writers go to the family’s home to conduct family interviews and assess the home for any safety concerns.