You could say we’re “The Little Engine that Could”: We started with a few concerned members of a church Sunday school group who saw foster kids being treated like second-class citizens and decided to do something about it.
Now, nearly 13 years later, we’ve turned foster care upside down and have emerged as one of the top child placement agencies (CPAs) in the state of Colorado, with more than 160 children rescued from the foster-care system and happily adopted. Each year we provide short- and long-term in-family care to hundreds of children in crisis.
Along the way we’ve created a program where children in foster care are nurtured and truly cared for, and where the foster parents who give these children a home can do so with a level of friendly, professional support not found anywhere else. Our strength comes from our Christian commitment to children, from our large and highly invested community of donors and supporters, and from our pledge to only accept first-rate foster parents who believe, as we do, that no child should ever feel less than loved.
The result? Hope & Home is recognized by numerous judges, child welfare experts and others as having the best foster parents, and as being the agency that does the best job taking care of foster children. Because of this, in October 2009 Hope & Home Executive Director and CEO Ross Wright was appointed by Colorado Governor Bill Ritter, Jr., to sit on the board of the state’s newly created Advisory Committee on Licensing of Child Care Facilities—making Hope & Home the only child placement agency in the state to be part of this elite team of professionals who are dedicated to improving the overall quality of foster care.
Among Hope & Home’s other distinctions:
* Member of the Center for Nonprofit Excellence;
* Member of the Colorado Springs Chamber of Commerce;
* Member of the Evangelical Council for Financial Accountability;
* Three-time recipient of the El Pomar Foundation’s Karl E. Eitel Merit Award