16 Questions to Ask Before Accepting a Placement

You’ve just been licensed and you’re waiting for the call.  You know where your phone is at all times and have the ringer set on high to an obnoxious tone so you won’t miss it.  So what now?  What happens when you get the call?  What kinds of questions should you ask?

I find that all brain processing goes out the window when on the phone with a caseworker, so I have a list of questions written down that I can refer to when I get a placement call.  Of course, I probably won’t end up asking all of these, so I’ve prioritized them from the essentials to “it’d be nice to know” questions.  Without further ado, here is my ultimate list of questions to ask before accepting a placement.

1. How many?  What ages?  What gender(s)?  You can read this post on why we choose to stick to birth order, but we don’t accept placements that are older than our biological children.  It’s a firm, non-negotiable for us, but despite being very vocal about our boundaries, we still get calls for children outside of our age range.  I find it easiest to lead with questions that would be an automatic dealbreaker for us than waste everyone’s time collecting details about a placement we can’t take.

   We also want to know how many children there are because we only have one extra bedroom.  Our first placement call was for a sibling group of 3.  I thought about it for a hot second before realizing we simply didn’t have enough bedroom space or anywhere to put 4 kids in my tiny car and my husband’s truck.  And we certainly didn’t have available daycare for all of them.  We had to turn it down for logistical reasons alone.

2. When is the child’s birthday?  Going along with age, a 4-year-old child could have just turned 4 or about to be 5 in a few days.  That’s a big difference!
3. Are there any dangers?  i.e. any history of physical or sexual abuse or other reported behaviors.  Since we have a young child in the home, we aren’t willing to accept placements with certain behaviors at this time.  It’s a deal-breaker for us.
4. Where is the case at?  Is this a short-term or long-term placement?  Is there an idea of how long the child might be staying with you?
5. When did the child enter foster care and why?  You can learn a lot from this question alone.  Have the children been bouncing from home to home, or were they just removed?  Were they removed because of physical abuse, sexual abuse, neglect, or addiction?
6. What is the child’s ethnicity?  Are you prepared to meet the cultural and religious needs of your foster child?
7. Does the child have siblings?  Sometimes sibling groups are split.  If they are, what’s the reason for that, is there a plan to move them into the same home, and do they have regular visits with the siblings?
8. Is there contact with parents?  What is the visitation schedule like?  Is it supervised or unsupervised?  Where are the visits and how often?  Sometimes you’ll run into a case where you’re driving a good distance every week for visits.  Is there transportation or is that up to you?
9. Do you have any information on family background?  Are both parents involved and do they have shared visitation?  Are they working on their case plan?  Are there involved family members?
10. Is the child coming with anything?  Is it the clothes on his back and you need to do some shopping, or is the child coming with some basic necessities?  For younger kids, you can ask if they have a car seat or booster.
11. Babies: What size diapers do they wear?  What type of formula and bottles do they use? Do they have Neonatal Abstinence Syndrome?  
12. Does the child have any diagnoses?  This could include any disability, mental illness, or if the child is on an IEP for educational needs.  Does the child have scheduled therapy or other appointments?
13. What is the child’s health?  Are they on any medications, have chronic illnesses, current on vaccinations, or have any allergies?
14. Does the child have lice?  I know some foster parents that treat every child coming into their home, and that’s a good way to go too.  Better safe than sorry!
15. What are the child’s likes/dislikes? What do you know about their personality and tendencies?  
16. Can you do a trial overnight? Do you have an option of doing a pre-placement visit to meet the child and see how it goes?

A lot of the time, the caseworker will have very limited information and won’t be able to answer all these questions.  Even then, the information they’ll have might be entirely wrong.  Instead of a 4-year-old boy, it might actually be a 2-year-old girl.  But don’t let that stop you from asking the questions or insisting on knowing a particular answer before accepting a placement.  It’s better to be a little persistent if it means you’ll have a clearer picture of what you’re getting into.