Sexual Health and Sexuality Education Needs Assessment of Young People in Care in Ireland (SENYPIC). The Perspectives of Foster Carers and Birth Parents: A Qualitative Analysis. Report No. 4

The report finds that fostering was largely a positive experience for foster carers, although experiences varied according to the young people involved. Foster carers were very aware that many YPIC had additional needs relating to emotional and social skills, and to address these needs they reported using family norms and household boundaries as a method of imparting social skills. The majority of foster carers engaged in a variety of approaches to RSE, and some reported use of covert references to sexual behaviour and use of humour when telling young people about the importance of safer-sex. What is particularly interesting about this report is that the indirect approaches to RSE delivered by foster carers mirrored those reported by parents of teenagers (not in care) who were interviewed for the 2009 research project 'Parents’ Approaches to Educating their Pre-adolescent and Adolescent Children about Sexuality'. What is clear from both reports is that parents and foster carers have additional supports and resource needs to support them in delivering RSE effectively to young people at-home, as current strategies were often indirect and not always effective.