National Kinship Care Month

Learn about kinship care, when children live with relatives or fictive kin (those known to the family). Kinship care, in its many forms, has become a focus in meeting the needs of children and youth involved in the child welfare system.

Review tips for legal and judicial professionals working with families and trying to avoid family separation through kin caregiving.

Learn what foster caregivers can do to promote reunification, which may include communicating with birth parents, the caseworker, and the agency; cultivating compassion; and maintaining contact with families after reunification or other permanency.

Explore how the Quality Improvement Center on Engaging Youth in Finding Permanency enhances youth involvement in permanency decisions through innovative training and coaching.

Browse a list of known kinship navigator programs by State and Territory with Tribes listed separately at the end. Each entry notes which families the program serves, in addition to providing basic service information and a website link.

Learn about the benefits of kinship care and how child welfare professionals can promote it by providing kinship caregivers with information, referrals, and support services to ensure the safety, permanency, and well-being of children in their care.

Offers a curriculum for prospective foster and adoptive parents, designed with input from experts and families and youth with lived experience, to prepare them before and provide ongoing skill building once a child is placed in their home.

Find a technical assistance tool for substance use treatment professionals who serve parents with alcohol and other substance use disorders (SUD) and their infants and children who may be affected by prenatal alcohol exposure.