The family man who fosters new families
When Lili’s foster-care mother saw her for the first time, she thought the 5-year-old girl was only about one because she was so tiny and couldn’t walk by herself.
The woman and her husband took Lili from a Shanghai orphanage and made their home hers. Now, about two decades on, the once weak child has become a Special Olympic athlete representing China.
“When she first came to our home, she had mental problems, so we had to hold her all the time,” her foster mother said. “She didn’t know how to use a toilet and could eat only congee and milk.”
At first Lili was scared by her new surroundings., and the family had to try hard to make her feel comfortable. The couple had a son about the same age as Lili, and the husband was at first leery about the cost of raising two children. But Lili worked her way into their hearts and was raised as if she were their own child.
The couple’s name can’t be revealed because of privacy restrictions of the program that sponsored the child for fostering -- a joint project between the Chinese government and UK-based nonprofit Care for Children. There are also restrictions on revealing details such as dates of fostering.
Founded by Robert Glover, the British organization entered China in 1998.
In 1996, when Glover was working for the British government, he made his first visit to China. At the time, foster care was a relatively new concept here. Orphans were either adopted out or grew up in institutions.
"At the first orphanage I visited in China, a little boy got hold of my hand,” Glover recalled afterward. “His clothes didn't fit, his shoes were broken and he hung on to me. I wondered how I was going to break free from him."
Glover talked with Shanghai officials about how foster care operates in Britain. They showed great interest. In 1997, the government invited him back to start a project in Shanghai.
Father of six, Glover moved his entire family to the city. It was not an easy decision. The large family drew a lot of attention at first.
"I remember we had a picnic on the Bund one weekend, and we had several hundred people following us, just to see this English couple with all the children!" he says. "It was a bit difficult."
Robert Glover (right) with his wife (second right) and their six children
Glover and his team created the first set of local training materials and even pioneered many of the Chinese terms for family-placement concepts. Now family-based care is a nationally recognized practice.
Glover makes the distinction between fostering and adoption.
“If you adopt a child, you sign the paper and become legally responsible, as well as socially, emotionally and financially,” he says. “In long-term foster care, a child is raised in a family that doesn’t have the means to pay education and medical fees, and sometimes needs emotional support. The family raises the child, but the government bears responsibility for educational and medical costs.”
Before taking a child home, a foster family undergoes a training session that teaches them how to communicate with the child and deal with all possible situations.
“Just like any other relationships, foster care parents and the child have a ‘honeymoon phase,’” he says. “After that, problems may emerge. For example, the child might doubt if the parents truly care about him or worries that he risks going back to the orphanage if he does something wrong.”
Some children, according to Glover, might test the parents by deliberately doing bad things, such as breaking a favorite household vase. When issues like that arise, the parents need to have the communication skills to convey the message clearly: “What you did was wrong but we love you nevertheless.”
Glover says wealthy or academic families might not be the best choice for foster care because such families are usually quite busy. The program looks for people who can devote the time and energy to raising a child with unreserved love, care and patience.
A foster father cuddles his boy.
Yanyan and her foster caring parents are a good example.
The couple had a son who left home after growing up, leaving them bereft at the loss of “family atmosphere.” When Yanyan went home with them, they found that the happy atmosphere returned. They took great efforts to teach her basic life skills.
At the time, the girl was severely malnourished and developmentally slow.
“My parents spent three days just teaching me to say the word ‘mum,’” Yanyan says.
Their endless patience transformed her life. She is now a self-taught pianist who has a family of her own. Knowing the importance of family, she married earlier than her friends.
Glover says the project in Shanghai has been very successful. Within four years, 500 children were placed with families, and the failure rate was about 2 percent, one of the lowest in a world where the average is 20-30 percent.
In the past few years, Care for Children has expanded its project to nearly 20 provinces, including Hunan, Yunnan and Sichuan.
After a successful national rollout, the project also entered a new stage in methodology called “Preparation for Independence.” It tries to build robust models of best practices in foster care.
"We aim to empower people to make a difference,” Glover says. “We have put the systems in place. A lot of it is quite simple. It's getting people to have hope."
