Coyote Hill Foster Care Ministries: Providing care for children in need

HANNIBAL, Mo. — April is Child Abuse Prevention Month. Coyote Hill Foster Care Ministries has been working to keep kids safe for over 30 years. The mission of Coyote Hill is to provide a safe place for a child impacted by foster care.

The Hill in Harrisburg, Mo., is Coyote Hill’s foster care neighborhood, featuring six large foster family homes and one duplex. Coyote Hill also has licensed foster homes throughout Missouri. Coyote Hill has foster care teams in Hannibal, Columbia, Jefferson City and Moberly. The Hannibal office opened in October 2021. Coyote Hill in Hannibal became a partner of United Way in 2022.

Coyote Hill also offers training relating to foster care to communities. The first step for a prospective foster or adoptive parent is to complete an assessment and training program to learn about trauma-informed parenting, as well as other effective parenting strategies. TBRI (Trust Based Relational Intervention) Training, Respite Care Provider Training, Spaulding Foster to Adopt Training, and CPR/First Aid/AED Training are offered by Coyote Hill on a continuing basis.

In a press release, Brittany McCaskey, Hannibal area coordinator for Coyote Hill, said, “Coyote Hill started as a children’s home. We were licensed as a residential facility and would hire house parents. Starting in 2020, we kind of did a model flip. We took what we learned in 30 years and took it outward into the community. So now we train and license new foster families throughout Missouri.”

The foster care system can be complicated, especially as foster families are starting their journey. Coyote Hill wants to ensure foster parents are supported and have someone to talk to about the experience and the children they take into their home.

McCaskey said, “Not a lot of people know what foster parents truly walk through, so we provide them with a family advocate to do life with them, to walk the journey.”

Family advocates provide in-home coaching and mentoring for foster families on a consistent basis, ensuring foster parents have what they need to be successful. Coyote Hill also offers support to foster families by providing foster parent community support groups in Moberly, Jefferson City and Hannibal.

McCaskey said, “We do community support groups for our foster families. Really just someone to listen, someone who has walked the journey ourselves. A lot of (Coyote Hill staff) have been foster or adoptive parents. Some of our staff have been in care themselves as children. We’re really just wanting to change the landscape of foster parenting.”

Coyote Hill also works to foster strong relationships between foster parents and biological parents of children in care.

“When we license a family we really tell them they are not just becoming a foster parent to the child, but we really want to foster the whole family, and so building relationships and connections with the biological parents,” McCaskey said. “Ultimately, when it can, reunification is the absolute best. That’s where we want kids to be. That’s what we want, for families to be reunited and to be together. Then these foster families can be fun aunts and uncles or respite or ongoing (support) when the kids go back home. I think our community is better when families can stay together, and so we’re excited to continue the conversation of how we can do child abuse prevention.”

If someone is interested in becoming a foster family, McCaskey encourages prospective foster parents to ask questions of others who are fostering. She suggests having coffee with a foster mom and learning of their experience. It is also important for foster parents to have supportive people in their lives.

“The most successful foster families are ones who also have really good support around them. You have to have people around you,” McCaskey said.

Fostering a child is not for everyone, but there are things everyone in a community can do to support foster families. That support and encouragement makes a difference. Listening to a foster parent, taking them a meal or buying them a gift card for food can be sources of support.

\“To be able to have that in some of your hardest seasons is such a blessing,” McCaskey said.

For more information about Coyote Hill, visit coyotehill.org or connect on Facebook at Coyote Hill Hannibal.