Fostering with Koinonia
Open Your Home to The Youth Who Need You MostEvery day, teens, sibling groups, and youth with additional behavioral, emotional, or medical support needs are looking for homes with none to be found. Sibling groups are split and teens wait longer to be matched with a foster family prepared to meet their unique needs.
Every child deserves the safety, stability, and belonging of a supportive home while they are in care.
As a Koinonia Resource Parent, you'll receive the training, resources, and clinical support needed to provide a stable, nurturing environment where healing can begin. Together, we can help youth build trust, strengthen relationships, and move toward permanency and a brighter future. Koinonia’s mission is grounded in providing safe, nurturing homes while supporting foster parents (referred to as resource parents in California) as the foundation of a child's healing and long-term success.
Why Foster with Koinonia?
Children entering foster care have experienced trauma, loss, and significant life changes. While every child deserves the opportunity to grow up in a safe and supportive environment, teens, sibling groups, and youth with more specialized support needs often wait longer to be matched with a foster family prepared to meet those needs.
You don't have to navigate foster care alone.
When fostering with Koinonia, you'll be part of a team committed to helping both you and the youth in your care succeed.
At Koinonia, we believe healing happens through meaningful relationships. That's why our Koinonia Resource Parents receive specialized training, ongoing guidance, clinical expertise, and therapeutic support to help them provide stability, encouragement, and compassionate care. Together, we work to help youth build trust, strengthen relationships, and move toward reunification, permanency, or another positive path forward.
Our trauma-informed approach recognizes each child's strengths while providing individualized, age-appropriate support within the stability of a family environment.
Who You May Care For
Koinonia Resource Parents may welcome youth from birth through young adulthood, but our greatest need is often for:
- Teens and adolescents
- Siblings wanting to stay together
- Youth with behavioral, emotional, or mental health challenges
- Youth with special health care needs
- Young adults preparing for independent living
Every child has unique experiences, strengths, cultural backgrounds, and goals. Our role is to help match children with families who can best meet their individual needs while honoring who they are. The populations served include youth with histories of trauma, developmental needs, sibling groups, behavioral challenges, LGBTQ+ youth, nonminor dependents, and youth requiring intensive services and therapeutic foster care.
You Won't Do It Alone
One of the biggest misconceptions about foster care is that resource parents are expected to manage everything themselves.
At Koinonia, our resource parents are part of a collaborative treatment team. Our clinicians, social workers, and community partners work alongside you to help the youth in your care succeed while providing the guidance and resources your family needs. Resource parents are viewed as the primary center of intervention within a coordinated team, supported through individualized treatment planning, case management, crisis response, and therapeutic services.
You'll Receive
- Specialized pre-service and ongoing training
- Weekly in-home support
- Dedicated clinical and social work support
- 24-hour crisis support
- Respite care
- Monthly reimbursement
- Mileage reimbursement for school transportation
- Discounts and resources through iFoster.org
Our Trauma-Informed Approach
Healing doesn't happen overnight.
Many youth have experienced abuse, neglect, multiple placements, or other significant challenges that affect how they communicate, build relationships, and respond to stressful situations.
Rather than asking "What's wrong with this child?" we ask, "What has this child experienced, and how can we help?"
Through trauma-informed care, individualized treatment planning, and consistent relationships, Koinonia Resource Parents help youth develop trust, confidence, healthy coping skills, and lasting connections. Koinonia's approach focuses on reducing the impact of trauma, preventing placement disruptions, building on strengths, and supporting family reunification or other permanency goals whenever possible.
Is Fostering with Koinonia Right for You?
You don't need to be perfect.
Many of our most successful parents simply have:
- A heart for helping youth
- Patience and flexibility
- A willingness to learn
- Room in their home and life
- A commitment to working as part of a supportive team
If you're ready to make a meaningful difference in the life of a teen, a sibling set, or a child with specialized needs, we'd love to help you explore whether fostering with Koinonia is the right fit for your family.