Programs and services

Become a foster parent

Potential foster parents need to be licensed and approved, and Minnesota requires foster parents to meet requirements prior to placing a child in your home. Learn the steps to become a foster parent in Minnesota. If you are related to your potential foster child, your county agency can place a child with you if you are unlicensed as long as you quickly complete the licensing process and meet the required state standards.

Additional support for foster families

Financial support for foster parents who want to adopt foster children
If you want to form a permanent relationship with your foster child, Paths to Permanency (PDF) outlines different reimbursement options for foster families choosing between adoption or kinship.

Financial support for children is available to eligible families through a program called Northstar Care for Children. Various supports are available depending on a family's situation. Northstar Adoption Assistance or Northstar Kinship Assistance were enacted in 2015 to address the evolving needs of Minnesota families. A former program addressed adoptive families financial supports prior to 2015.

Other available resources for foster parents listed below:
Training for foster parents
Licensing resources/information
Programs for current or former foster youth moving to adulthood
There's help for youth who are or were in foster care and want to live on their own. There's tuition assistance, job skills training, help finding work, housing and much more. County and tribal social services staff and a network of non-profit agencies make it happen.
Normalcy and reasonable and prudent parent standard training
The Preventing Sex Trafficking and Strengthening Families Act amended federal foster care Title IV-E, requiring states to support normalcy for all children in foster care. Children and youth in foster care need to experience the same types of developmentally appropriate and social activities that their friends, families and classmates — who are not in care — experience. This law permits foster parents, designated corporate foster care staff and residential staff to allow foster children to participate in normal childhood activities, including…, by applying the Reasonable and Prudent Parent Standard.

This two-hour training is required for child welfare case managers of foster care placements, child foster care licensing staff, child foster care parents, and designated staff at corporate or residential facilities. Clarify; do they need to review these documents and then are considered trained?
- PowerPoint slides from the May 24, 2016 Virtual Presence Communication (VPN), Normalcy and Reasonable and Prudent Parent Standard Training (PDF)
- Minnesota’s Reasonable and Prudent Parent Standard Guidance DHS-7684 (PDF)
- Training Certificate (PDF)
- Normalcy and Reasonable and Prudent Parent Standard Training” VPN, YouTube link from May 24, 2016