Our Program
The Family Room operates at multiple locations around the
Portland Metro area. Our model partners with local faith
communities for space, volunteers and meals.
WORTH
All human beings are equally worthy of the same access to opportunities for health, success, belonging, and happiness.
REUNIFICATION
Children living in foster care should ideally spend ample time with their parents, maintain ongoing relationships with their parents, and return to and grow up in their parent’s care.
HOPE
People are capable of change and can do better when they know better.
INTENTIONALITY
We view our families through a trauma-informed, strengths-based lens and adhere to a methodology of engagement that is evidence-based.
COMMUNITY
a) We model a healthy community for our families and help them build their own as they transition out of our program.
b) We partner enthusiastically and gratefully with other programs within the larger public community to more holistically serve our families.
FAITH
We commit ourselves to this work out of faith, humility, and a desire to follow Jesus’s example of loving people wholly regardless of past or present circumstances.
Program Model
The Family Room increases both the quantity and quality of family time in the following ways:
Quantity:
- The Family Room is available for families two days per week for ten hours total at each of our program locations.
- The Family Room always provides evening times that are typically outside of child welfare’s available hours to facilitate visits.
Quality:
- The Family Room provides supervised family time, but more critically, the program provides birth parents with modeling, guidance, education, and encouragement as they learn to safely and lovingly parent their children.
- The Family Room provides resource (foster) families with up to 10 hours per week of consistent respite care — a primary factor in preserving children in their resource homes.
- The home-like feel of The Family Room (kitchen, couches, dining room, tables, toys, etc.) allows for family interactions that better translate to normal day-to-day family events (getting a meal on the table, helping with homework, managing a tantrum, etc.).
- All family time sessions include a full meal for every child and parent, and the parents have the opportunity to participate in the preparation of the meals to increase their nutritional and culinary repertoire.
- The Family Room’s staff and volunteers all receive background checks and training.
- The Family Room offers a loving environment where every parent and child can experience the no-strings-attached support of a faith community that can remain involved even when the child welfare case closes.