At FosterParentCollege.com, we are very happy with the feedback we have been receiving about our courses from our new evaluation system. At the end of each course, viewers are now provided the opportunity to evaluate it. They are asked to rate the course on how much they disagree or agree with a series of statements, including that the course added to their knowledge about caring for children, that they would recommend the course to others, and that they liked the way the material was presented. During the month of September, we received feedback from 72.7% of our viewers, with average scores for all courses ranging from 4.35 (for material presentation) to 4.44 (for adding to child caring knowledge) on a scale of 1 (strongly disagree) to 5 (strongly agree).
Understanding Sex Trafficking Now Available
Children involved in the child welfare system are at high risk for being lured into sex trafficking. Resource parents play a valuable role in identifying those youth who are vulnerable to trafficking and intervening when they see warning signs. To assist foster, adoptive, and kinship parents in understanding sex trafficking and what it looks like, FosterParentCollege.com has just released the highly anticipated online course, Understanding Sex Trafficking.
This 2-credit course is led by Jennifer Shimer, MS, who is co-developer of the prevention curriculum, Closing the Gap: A Caregiver Approach to Reducing the Risk of Child Sex Trafficking and Exploitation.
We are always in the process of creating and adding new courses to FosterParentCollege.com. Developing high-quality, interactive training is an involved process. We start with understanding the need, finding a nationally recognized expert on the subject, then scripting the training, and designing the interactives. Once we have a good draft of a script, we send it to at least two other experts in the field. Using feedback from these reviewers, we finalize the script, and it goes into production. While the production team is recording and assembling the course, the handouts are finalized, the review questionnaire is developed, and other details are completed before the course can be launched. This process takes about a year for each course.
Additionally, some courses undergo evaluation research, involving both treatment and control groups, as well as at least a pretest and posttest, to assess the course's effectiveness. Most of these research studies also include either a 3-month or 6-month follow-up study to evaluate the course's longer term effects. This research process can delay release of the course to the general public by 6 months or more.
All of this work results in high-quality training products and comments like these, which we received during our study of the Advanced Parenting Workshop on Social and Physical Aggression:
"I was considering terminating foster care for my aggressive child for the sake of our other children, even though we dearly love him. Working with him just these few days using skills learned in this workshop has yielded very positive results. I'm looking forward to helping mold him into a more socially mature boy."
"We just finalized our adoption two days ago and I am so thankful that I took this workshop it has helped me to be a more intentional parent towards her. I love her and love seeing all the ways she's growing."
The workshop "helped us take a harder look at the reasons behind why he was behaving the way he was. Once we realized there were traumas behind the behavior, it made it much easier to take corrective actions on the behaviors in different ways."
New Workshop Helps Resource Parents Address Children's Problematic Sexual Behaviors
Sexual development, like physical or cognitive development, is a natural part of growing up. However, when children in care demonstrate a sexual behavior, especially a problematic sexual behavior, it can be alarming for resource parents. "Without education and support," explains Dr. Jane Silovsky, "it is not unusual for resource parents to request that children with problematic sexual behaviors leave their home. Unfortunately, this places the child at greater risk."
Our new workshop, Problematic Sexual Behaviors, is led by Dr. Silovsky, Director of the National Center on the Sexual Behavior of Youth. This Advanced Parenting Workshop will help resource parents understand children's sexual behavior and give them strategies for responding to behavior that is typical, concerning, or problematic.
Additionally, this workshop is the focus of our next research study, which includes pre- and posttests, as well as 3- and 6-month follow-up assessments. Stay tuned to future Solutions newsletters to hear our results.
Mindfulness Audio Exercises: New Free Resource on FPC
Mindfulness involves focusing all of one's attention on the moment and the immediate surroundings. It may best be thought of as a form of meditation. Our course, Children Entering Care: Mental Health Issues, introduces mindfulness as one tool that may help children (or adults) with anxiety or depression, or to reduce stress.
We have recently added several mindfulness audio exercises to the FPC website. These exercises may help parents whose children are experiencing stress or anxiety. We would like to thank Annaka Harris for providing us with these exercises. You can hear them here: fosterparentcollege.com/info/mindfulness.jsp
New Article About FPC Published by an Independent Researcher
A couple years ago, Foster Parent College was approached by Jordan Montgomery, then a PhD candidate at Florida State University, for permission to use our online course, Culturally Competent Parenting, as part of her dissertation research project. This independent research study was designed to determine whether parents who completed our course were more open to cultural receptivity when compared to a control group who did not see the course. Results of the study showed that parents who viewed our course had significantly higher scores for openness to cultural receptivity after completing the course than before. Results also showed that parents in the study group who viewed the course had significantly higher cultural receptivity scores than parents in the comparison group who did not.
Dr. Montgomery has published an article based on her dissertation research in the Journal of Marital and Family Therapy. For an abstract and link to the complete article, visit fosterparentcollege.com/info/research.jsp
Upcoming Courses
Foster Parent College is continually creating new courses and updating existing ones. We are currently working on these courses:
Children with Autism, 2nd Edition
Trauma-Sensitive De-escalation
Preparing for Post-Secondary Education, Grades 6 to 10
Eating Problems, 2nd Edition
Fetal Alcohol Spectrum Disorders
About FosterParentCollege.com
Since 2004, FosterParentCollege.com has been providing online, interactive courses designed specifically for foster, adoptive, and kinship families. FPC offers over 65 courses (including 14 in Spanish) taught by nationally recognized experts. Most of our courses are trauma informed, and FPC has been recognized by the California Evidence-Based Clearinghouse for Child Welfare (CEBC). Staff at participating agencies have access to our online administrative management system, which lets them register parents as users, assign courses, distribute handouts, and track program progress. At the same time, resource parents have the flexibility to take courses at their own convenience and pace, wherever internet access is available.