Perceptions of Safety among Children in Foster Care - Essay Example

In an effort to better understand the safety issues of children in foster care, this research seeks to develop a more integral comprehension of how children in foster care view their own personal safety. With this information, it will be possible to better understand specific safety issues indicative to foster care. In addition, this data will elucidate safety issues that may not be persistent concerns for children in foster care. With this data, social workers could develop programs to raise awareness and improve safety outcomes for children in this care setting. The US Department of Health and Human Services, Administration for Children and Families (2005) reports that at the end of 2004, 800,000 children were served by the foster care system.

Of these children, 304,000 represented new entrants into the program. Although this number is part of a larger trend representing a decrease in foster care over the last several years, it does represent a notable percentage of the child population in the United States. According to the US Census Bureau (2005), there were approximately 7.5 million children living in the US in 2004. As such, almost 10 percent of children in the US were involved in the foster care system at some point in 2004. Clearly, what this data reveals is that the foster care system comprises a significant portion of children living in the United States.

As the size of this population continues to grow, social workers and helping professionals are faced with the challenge of providing relevant care that can improve outcomes for children placed in these living arrangements. With the re. With the realization that so many children in the US are brought into the foster care system, there is a clear impetus to examine the safety of the overall system. A precursory overview of what has been written on the subject suggests that even though numerous authors have examined the issue of safety in the context of the foster care system, the exact manner in which safety is defined differs among scholars.

For instance, Altshuler and Gleeson (1999) maintain that there are a host of variables that must be taken into consideration when assessing the safety of the child in foster care. Among these variables are included: physical health; cognitive functioning and developmental delay. Interestingly, however, Bilaver, Jaudes, Koepke, and Goerge (1999) conceptualize the safety of children in foster care as directly related to the health of the child. For the formulation of the purpose statement, I would like to stress the question posed by the thesis.

The question primarily revolves around whether or not children feel safe in their foster home settings. Through the posing of this question, I will try to delve into the perception of safety for these children apart from trying to assert their concept of safety when they are placed in a foster home. In this context, I will try and conceptualize the perceptions of these children through their adult experiences through a focus on literature available from the psycho-analytical point of view and literary records of case studies of recalled experiences.

The thesis will also focus strongly on the perceptions of the parents who have adopted these children so as to get both sides of the story for more qualitative research.