So, what are you doing about it?

"A father to the fatherless, a defender of widows, is God in his holy dwelling. God sets the lonely in families, he leads forth the prisoners with singing." - Psalm 68: 5-6

Since I've been writing lately about what I've learned in recent weeks about the problems associated with many orphanages here in Cambodia and extolling the benefits of family/community-centered care, I thought I'd share a bit about how the organization with which I work, Children in Families, is helping to address this need. Children in Families was started in 2006 by Cathleen Jones who recognized the need to move away from institutionalized care for children in part from her own prior experience as an orphanage director. Currently we are helping over 200 children to live within safe, nurturing, family environments through our kinship care and foster care programs. Kinship care involves providing support to extended family members such as grandparents or aunts and uncles when a child does not have a living parent willing or able to care for him or her. Foster care involves supporting couples and families who wish to provide a good home to a child who has no living relatives willing or able to care for him or her. In both scenarios families receive assistance for food and school expenses for the children, as well as regular follow up from our Cambodian social work staff, including access to ongoing family education. When a child is referred to CIF (generally by government agencies, NGOs, or local officials) a CIF social worker investigates to determine if the child has any living family members potentially able to care for him or her. The child is placed into an emergency care family while his or her particular needs are assessed and, if family members have been identified, they are counseled to determine if the child can be successfully and safely reintegrated into the family framework. If the child is a candidate for kinship care this is preferable as it allows the child to remain connected with those already a part of his or her life. If not, the child is placed in a carefully screened foster family. In either case the family has a contract with Children in Families which outlines expectations and responsibilities. Children in Families has worked to develop good working relationships with local government officials and is in compliance with national standards of care. There is a lot more to be done and we partner with other organizations which have the same commitment to promoting community and family-based care in order to collaborate and maximize our efforts. We would like to grow in our capacity to reach more children and families and to facilitate the development of other similar programs all across Cambodia.

If you would like to find out more about Children in Families and/or how you can help to support community and family-based care in Cambodia please click here to check out our website. There is some good information about family-based care on the Resources page.