BC211
A non-profit society that connects people to community, health and government resources for help, where and when they need it. They help you find support services for all of life’s challenges. The service is free, confidential and available 24/7 in over 150 languages.
Parent Support Services Society of BC
For nearly 50 years the mission of PSSS has been to protect the safety and wellbeing of children and promote the health of all families in all their diversity in British Columbia.
- Kinship Care Support Line is staffed by two part-time advocates trained in advocacy, social work, family law, and government services related to kinship caregiving. Grandparent or other relative raising a family member’s child
604-558-4740 (Greater Vancouver)
1-855-474-9777 (Toll-Free)
grgline@parentsupportbc.ca - GRG Support Circles
Support Circles are here to provide a safe and confidential space for Parents and GRG/Kinship Caregivers, to share their challenges, concerns, questions and offer the Support Circles are free, confidential, anonymous, (often) weekly meetings of parents who wish to learn new ways to nurture and protect their children. - GRG/Kinship Facebook group
The GRG/Kinship Support BC Facebook group provides a larger opportunity for connection, sharing of resources and information. Grandparents raising grandchildren, and other kinship caregivers, in BC can join using this link. This a private group for kinship caregivers only.
Grandparents raising Grandchildren An overview of benefits available to clients providing kinship care: GRG KINSHIP CARE BENEFITS Session materials in the comment section.
British Columbia’s Representative for Children and Youth
BC’s Representative for Children and Youth supports our province’s young people and their families in dealing with the provincial child and youth welfare system. The Representative also provides oversight to this system and makes recommendations to improve it. The Representative is a non-partisan, independent officer of the Legislature, reporting directly to the Legislative Assembly and not a government ministry.
Legal Aid and Kinship Care Benefits and Funding Choices
Legal Aid link explains possible benefits and financial options if you discuss with an advocate
Engaging Kinship Caregivers: Managing Risk Factors in Kinship Care
These videos are modules in a training series featuring Joseph Crumbley, a kinship care expert.
- Guilt (Module One)
This module explores how child welfare workers and clinicians can manage the understandable feelings of guilt that relative caregivers may experience as a result of changing family dynamics. - Loss and Ambivalence (Module Two)
This module explores how kinship care creates interruptions of the caregiver’s plans, priorities, space and privacy and how these can contribute to feelings of loss and ambivalence. It is critical to understand how these feelings can present risk factors for the child if they aren’t addressed by child welfare workers and clinicians. - Projection and Transference (Module Three)
This module explores projection and transference, which are psychological terms about unconscious processes where we redirect our emotions from one person to another. These processes can become a risk factor in kinship care. - Engaging Kinship Caregivers: Hope, Fantasy and Denial (Module Four)
This module explores how one person’s hope can be another person’s denial. Understanding how important hope is for family members is critical to empathetically working with them to maintain these hopes and to make other plans — for the sake of the child in their care. - Engaging Kinship Caregivers: Loyalty Issues (Module Five)
This module explores a universal truth: Loyalty runs deep in families. Shared blood, history, memories and interdependence hold families together. This video shows child welfare workers and clinicians how to navigate these issues.
