The Child Protection Centre has issued a template for the annual informative report of Out-of-family Care Support Centres. The annual informative report has to be submitted by Out-of-family Care Support Centres to the Child Protection Centre by February 15th of 2026, covering the previous calendar year, 2025. We request all Out-of-family Care Centres to use this template to create their individual Annual Informative Reports 2025.
The Child Protection Centre has issued a detailed role description, including specific tasks, for a social worker employed at an Out-of-family Care Support Centre (hereinafter, Support Centre), to encourage the same approach in activities carried out by Support Centres.
The finalized job description (identifying roles and tasks of a social worker employed at a Support Centre) is derived from the legal framework and an analysis of pre-existing role and task descriptions submitted by Support Centres.
We encourage Support Centres to use this sample and adjust or expand it as needed by adding any information deemed necessary by the Support Centre.
The Child Protection Centre has issued these guidelines to establish a standardized approach to ensure that children placed in foster families and specialized foster families receive all services to support development, skill development, and general health improvement, tailored to their individual needs. These services, when not funded from the state or municipality budget or exceeding the preapproved amount, are provided in such cases: based on a recomendation from a medical professional treating the child or a recommendation from a social worker employed at an Out-of-family Care Support Centre and working with the child. Such a recommendation has to align with the long-term perspective on each child's unique needs.
Latvian SOS Children’s Village Association, in collaboration with Out-of-family Care Support Centre Tilts (“Kristīgās alianses bāreņiem ģimeņu atbalsta centrs “Tilts””), and being commissioned by The Child Protection Centre, has designed a Standard for Out-of-family Care Support Centre's training to prepare specialized foster families: including requirements for the educational content and training evaluation criteria. The standard analyzes the legal requirements for training prospective foster families, adoptive families, and legal guardians (hereinafter, Host families). The standard examines the practice of providing such training, offers a framework for host family training, and participant knowledge evaluation upon completion. In addition, the pre-existing requirements for training specialized foster families have been re-evaluated and updated, and the methodology of evaluating the knowledge and competencies of legal guardians has been improved (these evaluation reports are submitted to the respective Orphan's and Custody Court after training is completed). To improve the quality of these trainings, a questionnaire to collect participants' feedback has been developed.
The Child Protection Centre has developed guidelines for the annual evaluation of foster parents’ competencies to promote a consistent and standardized approach to assessing foster care. The evaluation focuses on determining how effectively foster parents uphold the child’s best interests by meeting the child’s developmental, emotional, and relational needs. Particular attention is given to the foster parents’ ability to support the formation of secure attachments and meaningful relationships within the foster family. The evaluation also examines whether the principles, practices, and care environment established within the foster family continue to uphold the child’s best interests.
The Child Protection Centre has issued guidelines for collaboration between Out-of-family Care Support Centres, Orphan's and Custody Courts, and social services of the respective municipality when placing a child in a foster family or a specialized foster family. The main goal of these guidelines is to promote a standard practice for cross-institutional collaboration to ensure safe child placement in an environment that would provide stability and permanency. These guidelines describe the respective responsibilities of collaborating institutions, establish procedures for exchanging information, and define the principles for providing support across institutions.
The Child Protection Centre has issued guidelines on preparing documentation for the Orphan's and Custody Courts for Out-of-family Care Support Centres, evaluating participants after completing a training for adoptive parents in an Out-of-family Care Support Centre. These guidelines have been issued to establish a standard of qualitative assessment of adoptive parents post-training. The guidelines provide a step-by-step guide to creating an objective assessment that gives a clear overview to support the Orphan's and Custody Court in decision-making while upholding the best interests of the child.