Your description is very similar to mine here in California.

Big hugs to you both. We turned down any placements that did not have parental rights already terminated and STILL ended up being at risk of losing our child (who we intended to adopt from Day One) a year into fostering. It was incredibly stressful.

I did this in college for parents who had disabled kids. Super rewarding and eye-opening if you haven't had much experience with disabled children.

I believe my MIL was a GAL but not through a local CASA. Probably just a regional difference. Her client was a baby who was eventually adopted by their foster parents.

You can choose who you want to work with (age, gender, situation). You are more likely to have interactions with the foster parents than thw bio parents, though you may see them in court once every few months. Sometimes the bio parents are in jail already, and are brought to court by the jail just to attend the hearing.

A big piece of this is the neglecting of mental health. Many folks who cannot take care of their kids have undiagnosed mental health issues (often self-medicated by drug abuse, etc). Their kids end up in foster care AND may have those same, undiagnosed mental health issues. Depending on the diagnosis, behaviors can downward spiral into a criminal record.

This is not the case for everyone, of course. This is what I've observed teaching fostercare students, being a CASA, and being the parent of a kid adopted out of foster care. It's a challenging path for anyone involved.

Lots of horrible situations, lots of weird stuff. One of my clients was placed into foster care with a biological relative who had their own issues. The CASA I worked with had a long training process, which was quite helpful. I was also a teacher, so I already had experience with kids and their parents / guardians. This helped.

You're not giving the kids therapeutic counseling. You're giving them emotional support, and recording / reporting what you learn about them and their situation. You can be a squeaky wheel and try to get them more of what they need, but it doesn't always workout.

Same here. I made sure my clients got school / hobby materials (paid for by me, then reimbursed by CASA). I also had to complete court reports about their school progress, wellbeing, and share their opinions about placement, etc. with the judge.

I would think so. I was usually seeing my clients 1x week for a few hours or whole afternoon. Their social worker from the county saw them for 10 minutes, once a month. I was able to provide a lot more accurate and up to date info regarding the child's status.

Edit: If during the week, best to visit them after school.

My MIL did it in Florida, it was called being a Guardian Ad Litem (sp) not CASA. might want to Google that as well.

I was a CASA, AMA :)

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