Animal Welfare Professionals

Greetings!!

I am an adoption counselor for our county shelter. The Foster Coordinator and I are in brand new roles for our shelter, and we are learning and improving the programs as we go.

We are looking for tips and tricks on setting up meet & greets between a foster family and a potential adopter. Recently we had a situation where a foster was gatekeeping and grilling the potential adopter. Our potential adopter was very put off with the communication from the foster and ended up adopting a dog from a different organization. The potential adopter still supports our shelter and appreciates what we do here and understands that how the foster handled things isn't a reflection on our efforts. We would like to improve this process moving forward though.

How do you handle meet & greets? Do you set up the appointments between the foster/adopter yourself, or do you have them figure it out themselves? Do you have them meet at the fosters home or a neutral location, or do you have them meet at the shelter?

Do you have a foster handbook? If so, can you post it here?

Any information is appreciated! Thank you to everyone for all that you do!

Hi! Our foster program has just recently expanded to having adult dogs and cats go out to foster. Before we were only kittens and puppies. We (the shelter) do everything ourselves. Our fosters report back to us how the animal is doing and they send us photos and videos. We post about the animals and if anyone is interested in adopting, they come to the shelter and fill out the matching questionnaire. If they are approved, we contact the foster to arrange a time that works for both the foster and potential adopter to bring the animal to the shelter for a meet & greet. Our foster handbook is still only for puppies and kittens. We don't really have policies for adult cats other than they can't go outside. Right now, we only have a weekend foster program for adult dogs and haven't sent any out long term. I emailed shelters all around the US to ask what their policies were and most of them were kind enough to share them. I basically picked out things that I liked from each one and created a policy.  Austin Pets Alive and the SPCA in Texas were really helpful. 

Greetings!!

I am an adoption counselor for our county shelter. The Foster Coordinator and I are in brand new roles for our shelter, and we are learning and improving the programs as we go.

We are looking for tips and tricks on setting up meet & greets between a foster family and a potential adopter. Recently we had a situation where a foster was gatekeeping and grilling the potential adopter. Our potential adopter was very put off with the communication from the foster and ended up adopting a dog from a different organization. The potential adopter still supports our shelter and appreciates what we do here and understands that how the foster handled things isn't a reflection on our efforts. We would like to improve this process moving forward though.

How do you handle meet & greets? Do you set up the appointments between the foster/adopter yourself, or do you have them figure it out themselves? Do you have them meet at the fosters home or a neutral location, or do you have them meet at the shelter?

Do you have a foster handbook? If so, can you post it here?

Any information is appreciated! Thank you to everyone for all that you do!

Greetings!!

I am an adoption counselor for our county shelter. The Foster Coordinator and I are in brand new roles for our shelter, and we are learning and improving the programs as we go.

We are looking for tips and tricks on setting up meet & greets between a foster family and a potential adopter. Recently we had a situation where a foster was gatekeeping and grilling the potential adopter. Our potential adopter was very put off with the communication from the foster and ended up adopting a dog from a different organization. The potential adopter still supports our shelter and appreciates what we do here and understands that how the foster handled things isn't a reflection on our efforts. We would like to improve this process moving forward though.

How do you handle meet & greets? Do you set up the appointments between the foster/adopter yourself, or do you have them figure it out themselves? Do you have them meet at the fosters home or a neutral location, or do you have them meet at the shelter?

Do you have a foster handbook? If so, can you post it here?

Any information is appreciated! Thank you to everyone for all that you do!

Hi! I just wanted to put some resources here that may be helpful:

• Several studies have shown that pets adopted from foster homes are less likely to be returned than those adopted from the shelter. You can find more information in this document: https://forum.maddiesfund.org/communities/community-home/librarydocuments/viewdocument?DocumentKey=17e62b27-345a-4332-8c89-8e37d54ffd4e&CommunityKey=afce7f7a-fd5a-431e-9f2a-aaedc46a03d6&tab=librarydocuments Giving fosters the training they need to do this is key.
• Fosters as well as staff can take our Adoption Counseling course on MU. There are also courses on open adoptions.
• You can find more lots of resources and templates on adoption from foster homes in this Collection on MU

Greetings!!

I am an adoption counselor for our county shelter. The Foster Coordinator and I are in brand new roles for our shelter, and we are learning and improving the programs as we go.

We are looking for tips and tricks on setting up meet & greets between a foster family and a potential adopter. Recently we had a situation where a foster was gatekeeping and grilling the potential adopter. Our potential adopter was very put off with the communication from the foster and ended up adopting a dog from a different organization. The potential adopter still supports our shelter and appreciates what we do here and understands that how the foster handled things isn't a reflection on our efforts. We would like to improve this process moving forward though.

How do you handle meet & greets? Do you set up the appointments between the foster/adopter yourself, or do you have them figure it out themselves? Do you have them meet at the fosters home or a neutral location, or do you have them meet at the shelter?

Do you have a foster handbook? If so, can you post it here?

Any information is appreciated! Thank you to everyone for all that you do!

Greetings!!

I am an adoption counselor for our county shelter. The Foster Coordinator and I are in brand new roles for our shelter, and we are learning and improving the programs as we go.

We are looking for tips and tricks on setting up meet & greets between a foster family and a potential adopter. Recently we had a situation where a foster was gatekeeping and grilling the potential adopter. Our potential adopter was very put off with the communication from the foster and ended up adopting a dog from a different organization. The potential adopter still supports our shelter and appreciates what we do here and understands that how the foster handled things isn't a reflection on our efforts. We would like to improve this process moving forward though.

How do you handle meet & greets? Do you set up the appointments between the foster/adopter yourself, or do you have them figure it out themselves? Do you have them meet at the fosters home or a neutral location, or do you have them meet at the shelter?

Do you have a foster handbook? If so, can you post it here?

Any information is appreciated! Thank you to everyone for all that you do!