What exactly goes on in a home study? I know they check out the house and everything is in working order and that chemicals and medications are locked up. What else goes on? I'm also wondering like how long they usually last? I'm one of those people who get so nervous in interviews and stuff but I am totally fine in other situations. I have a feeling I would straight up fail a home study because they would wonder why the heck I am a ball of nerves?
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In our agency the home study started with us filing out paper work and questions about ourselves. Then we had interviews together and separately with a social worker. Then we had to start gathering the legal documents and fingerprinting. Then the final step was checking the home. We had a long list of things we needed to have done so I would check with your state regulations. Your house has to meet the foster care home requirements. And don't worry tons of people are a ball of nerves.
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It's hard to "fail" a homestudy. For the agencies here in Utah, you will fill out an extensive (and invasive) questionnaire. They even ask about your sex life, mental health history, upbringing, traumatic events etc. While you are filling that out, you also have to get a background check including fingerprints as @Mrs. Train: said. You'll need to provide tax returns, marriage certificates and evidence of sufficient funds for adoption.
The social worker will review all the materials and then come to your house with a prepared list of questions for both partners (or just you if you are single). They'll interview you together and alone, tour your home, and then leave. They'll contact you with a list of follow up questions and requests that you must address within a certain time frame.
If you are doing foster to adopt rather than our local private agencies, then you'll have to go to MAPP training and lots of other orientation type things.
All in all, it's a giant paper chase that requires you to be thoughtful and introspective together as a couple and individually.
We actually thought it was pretty fun, though grueling and invasive
(I guess because it got us one step closer to our precious girl!)
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We also started with tons of paperwork....as in depth as they wanted to know the type of heating and cooling system, and if we had city sewers. I don't think those are make or break kind of things, but I thought it was odd that they asked.
After the paperwork the social worker did an initial background just to make sure we weren't crazy people. Then we had to make three appointments to meet with the social worker. Two in her office, and one at our house.
Each meeting was two hours long and we discussed our relationship and, well, our entire lives.
I'm noticing that lots of states are different in their requirements. I've seen some people say that they have to have the fire inspector come to their house, and in our home visit, the social worker didn't even ask about our fire extinguisher.
One thing I didn't expect was for our social worker to be so nice. She made the whole process really easy for us, and made me feel silly for being so worried.
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@Mrs. Polish: Oh yeah, you reminded me that we had two in person visits and 1 phone appointment... and then after placement, we had 2 in person visits!
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I think the most important is to check what the requirements are in your state. We live in Indiana and our home study was a little different than the ones @Mrs. Jacks and @Mrs. Train went though. They're all basically the same, but each state is different.
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Our agency won't allow us to start meetings with our social worker until 75% of our paperwork is turned in, so we are still working on that. I've been told that we will have a couple of meetings at the agency where she'll interview us indivudually and together and then she'll come out to our house to check things out. I'm usually an anxious person, but I'm not too nervous about these meetings - they really want to approve you and the director of our agency assured us that pretty much everyone will be approved. I'm more anxious about our fire insepction next week!
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@loveletter: You are going to do great.
By the way, I forgot to mention medical clearance by your doctor...
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@Mrs. Jacks: wow!!! that is a lot of information... why do they need to know things like sex life?? I understand mental history, financial information etc..
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@Mrs. Pen: I think they are looking to see that you have appropriate boundaries and no red flags. I'm sure there is great worry for abuse and I'm guessing that they might think they would pick some people up just by asking about it.
We definitely answered that question with a very appropriate non answer!
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@Mrs. Jacks: very interesting... that makes sense!
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@Mrs. Pen: we had to answer things about our marriage and sex and fighting. I got the impression that it was to see if we were a well balanced married couple. We went through a Christian agency so part of their requirements are that you were in a marriage with Christianity in your home. So we had questions like what is your fighting style and how do you resolve conflicts?How do you show love for each other physically? They really get into the nitty gritty.
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My sister is actually a social worker who does just this for a living and I have heard her stories about the totally random crazy stuff she has to ask about. I was shocked to hear about the sex questions, but I guess they're standard. Like someone said, to make sure you have a healthy, adult relationship with proper boundaries.
She also told me that she has to ask each partner if they're satisfied with their sex life. If each person has the same answer (yes OR no) then it's ok, but if one person differs then that is a flag for follow up or whatever. So weird!
(I guess because it got us one step closer to our precious girl!)
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