Fostering in
Wales

I’m Chloe, the Fostering Recruitment Manager for TACT Cymru. I’ve worked in fostering services in Cymru for 13 years, having started my career as a placements officer, matching children who needed fostering families to the families we worked with. I progressed to a social work assistant and then a supervising social worker when I qualified, supporting families who fostered as well as completing fostering assessments. I then joined a Cymru-wide fostering charity as a supervising social worker and ended up managing the service prior to joining TACT in January 2024. I also grew up as part of a family that fostered, so understand the day-to-day realities of the role and how rewarding it truly is.

I chose to work for TACT because of their values and charity status. TACT have always been a charity since the service began over 30 years ago, and the ethos of re-investing in the children and young people we support really resonated with me. The fact that we are solely a fostering service also appealed to me – I love how everyone throughout the service is passionate about supporting the best possible outcomes for the children and young people we care for.

I love being involved in foster carer recruitment as it’s an exciting journey to go on with people as they begin their fostering career. I love being able to share my knowledge and experience with people at the start of their fostering journey, answering various questions people may have and getting to know people from all walks of life. Recruiting caring, kind and compassionate people is crucial in ensuring vulnerable children and young people can thrive and my role allows me to play a big part in that. No two days are the same and I really enjoy the variety – one day I may be attending an information session for people interested in finding out more about fostering, the next I could be recording a podcast or visiting a prospective foster carers home.

I love getting to meet so many interesting people and hearing about their life stories, and how this can relate to fostering. My husband says I’m nosy, but I just really enjoy chatting to people and finding out about them. My role also involves working closely with current foster carers as they support the recruitment process and I love working with such committed, dedicated people.

People going through the process to become foster carers have support every step of the way, from enquiry call to initial home visit and throughout the assessment. We tailor the timescales to everyone’s needs – some people want more time to think about fostering while others want to dive straight into the process. We have foster carer representatives who are on hand to talk to people and share their fostering stories too, which enquirers often find really helpful.

We provide the Skills to Foster training for enquirers and further online training during the assessment, to equip applicants with the knowledge and skills they need to be foster carers. Applicants have an allocated assessing social worker; however, I am always available to contact throughout the assessment, and we meet during the assessment to see how things are going. People can expect home visits from the assessing social worker, as well as tasks to complete in between visits. The foster carer representatives are also on hand to offer support during the assessment and often invite applicants along to their regular support groups, where they will be able to meet other foster carers and hear all about their experiences.

In my spare time I enjoy going for walks with our cheeky cockapoo and our son (not sure who’s cheekier!), spending time with family and friends and love a good book when I have the time! I recently tried skiing during a family holiday to Lapland and am keen to learn how to do it properly! I also have a love of horses and one of my goals this year is to get back to horse riding.

Whether fostering is something you’ve just started thinking about, or you’ve done all your research and are ready to start the process, I can answer any questions you may have and explain more to you about the support TACT provide!