Strategies to strengthen resilience for children in the child protection system

Children, who are in the child protection system, in residential care or foster care, have to face different stressful situations brought about by being separated from the family context. To achieve a successful family reunification afterwards these children have to overcome a series of phases throughout the reunification process such as: the notification of the measure (separation from the family) visits and contact during foster care, preparation for the family reunification and lastly the return home and their consequent adaptation. To help with this process the GRISIJ group used the cooperative research framework (MCI:EDU2011-30144-C02-01) as presented, to find out which strategies strengthen resilience in the different phases of the reunification process, by analyzing the needs felt and presented by the children. Field work was carried out in 2012 with children in child protection and with the welfare staff. Focus groups were formed and interviews carried out in four autonomous regions in Spain. Thirty adolescents and pre-adolescents who were or who had been in child care and protection participated. The needs detected were: help to cope with the distress and confusion, the importance of informal support and the need of the children to participate more themselves in the process. Strategies which helped them overcome this process and achieve a successful reunification were recognized: having certain social skills; a capacity to resolve conflicts, a feeling of control, coping skills, having informal support and take the correct standpoint and attitude towards the measure.