Staying Put is a program that allows young people to continue living with their foster families after turning 18, offering stability and support as they transition into adulthood.
Staying Put allows young people to remain with their foster families after turning 18, providing stability as they transition into adulthood. It helps them build confidence, develop life skills, and maintain important relationships, offering essential support during this crucial period. This stability allows them to focus on education, work, or personal growth with a secure foundation.
In the past, care leavers were often expected to become independent at 16, moving from foster care to supportive lodgings or bed-sits. Many struggled to build stable adult lives due to a lack of continuity in relationships and support. Informal help from foster carers depended on goodwill, and at 18, most care leavers still weren't ready for independence—something rarely expected of their peers. While continuing education is encouraged for young adults, it remains difficult for unprepared care leavers living on their own.
The key objectives of ‘Staying Put’ are to build services that:
Help young people to build on and nurture attachments within a family base.
Allow young people to move to independence at their own pace, supported to make the transition to adulthood in a more gradual way, similar to other young people who can rely on their own families for this support.
Provide young people with the stability and support necessary to achieve in education, employment and training (EET). ‘Staying Put’ may offer an opportunity to encourage young people who were not engaged, to re-engage in EET.
Listen to young people’s views about the timing of transition to independence from their final care placement.
While Nexus Fostering acknowledges the differing approaches of local authorities to ‘Staying Put’, the agency has devised terms to bring consistency of service and expectations for its carers and young people. Our aims are:
To allow a young person already fostered within a Nexus Fostering household, to remain in their current home following their 18th birthday.
To offer support to young people who require assistance in the transition to adulthood through a supported familiar environment and within an established relationship.
To be sensitive/responsive to the enduring needs for a family base as a result of (but not limited to) positive family membership, continuing education (or requiring a return base for residential/university education), vulnerability to abuse or exploitation, delayed maturity and emotional immaturity. (Young people with an on-going cognitive disability may meet the criteria for adult services and their placement would be managed within an adult placement/Shared Lives arrangement, outside of Nexus Fostering services).
Jess has lived with her foster carers for several years and has settled into life there. From supporting her foster brother to her favourite outings, Jess shares her experiences with us of living with her foster family and her plans now that she has turned 18.
Deb and her partner have taken two of their foster children through to the age of 18, with their young man now in a Staying Put arrangement, they now offer respite care.
After raising four of their own son's Sylvia and Denis decided six years ago to continue taking care of young people and currently foster a teenager who they say 'It is a joy to have him in our home'.
