Hephzibah Children's Association- Family Based Services

Hephzibah is Oak Park s oldest social service agency founded in 1897. Today Hephzibah s mission is a multifaceted one. We offer short- and long-term group homes for children traumatized by neglect and abuse, child welfare and family services, foster care and adoption programs and award-winning day care on a sliding scale for families of all income levels.

Sometimes, helping a child means finding a loving, caring and safe environment outside of the home. When this is the case, our award-winning Foster Care Program ensures that there are licensed family homes, on a temporary basis, for children in crisis. Our dedicated foster parents are specially trained to provide the love, constancy and support needed to help neglected and abused children heal and learn to trust again.

Sometimes foster care is a temporary arrangement while parents and children receive the counseling, services and support they need to succeed as a family unit. When returning home to their biological parents isn t an option, many of the children in our Foster Care Program form permanent families with their foster parents through Hephzibah adoptions.

Hephzibah s Foster Care Support Services Program was established in 2002 to help traumatized children make a successful transition from our group homes into loving foster and adoptive homes. To help ensure the success of each placement, Hephzibah s Foster Care Team provides an extensive array of foster care support and stabilization services, including:

- Our Weekender Program, which helps the children living in our group homes prepare for a successful transition to family life by providing opportunities for them to spend weekends with a licensed Hephzibah foster families
- In-home consultation and support for foster families
- Respite services
- Foster parent training sessions on topics ranging from positive discipline to educational advocacy
- Foster parent support groups
- Private consultations for foster parents grappling with the challenges of parenting children who have been traumatized by neglect or abuse
- Parenting groups for biological family members, facilitated by a foster care specialist