Fostering in Essex

If changing the lives of children and young people in your local area is important to you, then fostering in Essex could be your next step.

Fostering is all about providing children with a stable and caring home – somewhere that they can recover from any trauma, neglect or abuse they may have experienced. Many of our current foster carers state that it is extremely rewarding to watch children regain their confidence at school or college – or just generally in their everyday lives. There are lots of different types of fostering that you can do, and our team of enquiry officers here at TACT will be able to advise you about the different ways that you could make a difference.

As young people come into care for different reasons, the length of time that they remain in foster care can vary. Conflict or illness within the family could mean that children only need to be fostered for a short period of time. Sadly, many young people require care for much longer due to neglect or abuse. TACT are recruiting foster carers in Essex in order to provide care and guidance for these vulnerable young people.

To begin your fostering in Essex journey, you don’t need any previous experience as full training will be provided (at no cost to you). As we are a charity, we reinvest surplus income into providing more support and training for our fostering households. However, some form of childcare experience would be preferable. You may also have other additional skills from previous jobs that you could bring into fostering, such as caring for children with learning or physical disabilities.

There are some initial requirements to fulfil in order to start a fostering application. They are:

To be aged 21 years or over
To have at least one spare bedroom in your home
Be a full time resident of the UK

If this sounds like something YOU could do, you could join our Fostering Essex team!

TACT foster carers, The Wrights, talk about how proud they are of the young people they have cared for, and about the support they receive from TACT:

Why foster in Essex with TACT?

TACT is the UK’s largest dedicated fostering charity. We reinvest any surplus income into providing more support and training for foster carers interested in fostering.

As one of the leading fostering agencies in Essex, we provide our foster parents with training and support that is local to them – to enable them to change young people’s lives. Because we reinvest surplus income, we can provide additional support over and above what is required of a fostering charity, such as a dedicated education service, health service and an online foster carer portal.

We’re more than just a fostering agency – we go above and beyond to look after our foster carers and the children they provide care for. Our TACT Connect service ensures that when children leave the care system, they have TACT’s support for life.

This is why 98% of our carers would recommend us to others thinking of fostering.

“Being a former foster child myself, I was ready and pleased to help vulnerable children in need. I chose to foster with TACT because I liked the fact that they are a charity and since the beginning they have proved to be very helpful and supportive whenever needed.”

– Foster Carer (East London)

Fostering Essex Allowance

Foster carers are highly skilled people, and our fees and allowances reflect this.

If you join our Fostering Essex team, the total fostering allowance that you receive will vary based on a number of factors, including the type of foster care you are providing, the number of children that you care for and their age, as well as the complexity of their needs.

You will also receive additional payments for children’s birthdays, holidays and religious festivals. Additionally, we also pay long service awards and a Refer a Friend fee (if you recommend someone who then goes on to be an approved foster carer with us).

In terms of the weekly fostering Essex allowance you could expect to receive when you have a young person placed with you, here are some examples:

These are examples of our fostering Essex allowance

Full training

You don’t need any previous experience or training to become a foster carer. Our full training will ensure that you are fully prepared to care for children in your home.

Our initial training is called Skills To Foster, and is taken within the foster carer assessment period. You are then allocated a full training programme to further your skills – helping you care for, and make a difference to, more children and young people.

We even provide specialist training in order to help you care for children with specific needs or requirements.

24/7 support

We understand how important a high level of support is to our foster carers, which is why we reinvest surplus income into providing more support for our fostering families. Also, our Supervising Social Workers have manageable workloads, so that they are able to dedicate more time to you. After all, the better we support you, the better you will be able to provide the care and guidance required to change children’s lives.

This is what we provide:

Full 24/7 support. Your Supervising Social Worker will usually provide all the support you need, but we also have a dedicated out-of-hours support service for total peace of mind.
Foster carer portal. An online community of TACT foster carers and a place to find information, advice, training and other resources to help you with your day-to-day life as a foster carer.
Education service. Our specialist service provides support and advice to help ensure that the children in your care receive the best possible educational opportunities.
Health service. Our health service was established in order to provide young people in your care with ongoing physical and mental health monitoring.
Support groups. Our support groups operate all over the country, and provide you with a local outlet to meet other carers in your area, share experiences and knowledge, and even make new friends!
Support for young people. Our Children’s Resource Workers provide the children in your care with additional support, activities and events.
Supporting your own children. We understand that your own children play an important role in the fostering household. As such, our Children Who Foster events provide your own children with an opportunity to socialise with other young people who make an amazing contribution to fostering.
Peer support. In some areas, peer-to-peer support may be available. These work by pairing newly approved foster carers with experienced TACT carers to provide another level of support.

Transferring to TACT

We understand that there are a number of reasons why people who are already approved foster carers may look to transfer from their local authority or agency. If you are currently a foster carer in Essex, we can provide a ‘fast track’ application process to ensure that the transfer to us is straightforward and stress-free.

You can even transfer to us with children already in placement. In all situations, the wellbeing of the child will always come first, so ensuring stability and consistency continues for the child or young person is something we would work very closely with you on.

If you are interested in finding out more about transferring to us, simply select ‘I am currently a foster carer’ on our form. We will then be able to talk you through the process in more detail.

A fostering charity that goes above and beyond…

Our foster carer perks include a number of exclusive memberships and special offers – many of which are available via our Foster Carer Portal.
Our TACT Connect service ensures that our care leavers continue to receive help, support and guidance even after they have officially left our care.
We advocate for young people, actively campaigning in order to instigate positive change within the care system.

Start your fostering journey today, and change a child’s life. Simply fill in the form on this page to get started!