Working with Siblings in Foster Care Toolkit was funded through a cooperative agreement between the Hunter College School of Social Work in New York and the Children’s Bureau to the National Center for Child Welfare Excellence.

Every time I watch Sasha Charles’ brilliant digital story (see: www.nrcpfc.org/digital_stories/YP_Charles_S) about the love she has for her brother and the pain she felt in being separated from him while in foster care, I get so flooded with emotions that I need to compose myself for a few minutes after watching it – and this is after seeing it about 300 times! Sibling relationships are among the most intense bonds any person will ever experience.  Think about it:  Who would you be without your brother or sisters?  How would you feel if you were told you would never be able to see them again?

Not surprisingly, discussions about siblings in child welfare are frequently fraught with strong emotional responses from professionals in the field.  As noted expert Dr. Rebecca Hegar, writes “Surprising controversies arise over the meaning of the word “sibling.” Rooted in an archaic word for “kin,” sibling most literally means “little kinfolk,” and it originally included such relatives as cousins, as well as brothers and sisters. In contemporary usage, siblings share one or both parents by birth or adoption. Most typically, the siblings identified in child welfare research are either full siblings or half-siblings with the same mother. This occurs because child welfare agencies typically track children based on the mother’s identity, unless she is not present in the home.

Clearly, child welfare practitioners, researchers and policy makers could benefit from guidance on this topic which we believe our Toolkit provides.  Since the Toolkit is web-based, as we hear of promising practices and emerging research, we will make modifications to the Toolkit and we hope that those who use this will feel free to keep us appraised of these changes to share with the filed.

I am grateful to our colleagues at the Children’s Bureau/ACF/DHHS for their insight into the need for such a toolkit. Taffy Compain, Federal Project Officer for the National Resource Center for Permanency and Family Connections, has spearheaded this process and provided guidance and direction in making this Toolkit a reality.

I want thank the staff and our consultants at the National Resource Center for Permanency and Family Connections for their work on this toolkit. I want to recognize especially Joan Morse our Assistant Director at the NCCWE who coordinated the development of the toolkit and our NCCWE project consultant, Madelyn Freundlich, who took the lead in the development of this toolkit.

Gerald P. Mallon, DSW
Julia Lathrop Professor of Child Welfare
Executive Director, National Center for Child Welfare Excellence