Can free online foster training count towards required preparation?

Free online training is usually best treated as preparation rather than a replacement for your fostering service’s required pre-approval training. Whether it can contribute to your preparation depends on the course content, the evidence you can provide and the judgement of the fostering service assessing you.

A fostering service may review previous learning when it considers your application. Factors it may look at include:

• whether the subject matter matches the preparation topics it requires;
• who provided the course and whether the content is suitably reliable and current;
• whether you completed the whole course rather than only viewing selected material;
• whether you have a certificate, completion record or other evidence;
• how recently you completed it; and
• whether the training covered fostering in practice, rather than discussing children or safeguarding only in general terms.

Even where an online course is considered relevant, the fostering service may ask you to complete its own sessions. This allows the agency to explain its procedures, expectations and support arrangements, and gives you an opportunity to discuss how the learning applies to your household. It also enables the assessing social worker to check your understanding rather than relying only on a certificate.

Pre-approval preparation commonly explores areas such as safeguarding, safer caring, confidentiality, recording, allegations, boundaries, equality, health and safety, attachment, trauma, children’s behaviour, contact with birth families and working with professionals. The exact programme differs between fostering services. A short introductory course may cover some of these subjects but leave important gaps, particularly around the practical responsibilities of foster carers and the procedures used by the agency.

Online learning may therefore be used in several ways:

• As background preparation: it can help you understand key terms and identify questions before formal training begins.
• As evidence of existing knowledge: the assessing team may record relevant prior learning and avoid repeating some introductory material, subject to its own policy.
• As additional learning: it can strengthen your understanding alongside the required programme.
• As a starting point for discussion: topics raised online may help you and the assessing social worker identify areas that need more explanation.

It is important not to assume that a certificate automatically transfers from one fostering service to another. Each service has responsibility for deciding whether your preparation is sufficient for its assessment and approval process. A course described as accredited, certified or suitable for foster carers may still not meet that particular service’s requirements.

If you have already completed free online training, keep the course title, provider details, completion date, certificate and any outline of the modules. Tell the fostering service about it at the start of your enquiry or application. You can then ask whether the material will be taken into account and whether you need to complete any additional sessions. Do not leave required training out of your plans until the agency has confirmed this in writing or through its formal process.

There is also a difference between preparation before approval and learning after approval. Foster carers continue to develop their knowledge once they begin fostering, with their fostering service setting expectations for ongoing training and development. Free online material can support that learning, but it does not remove the need to follow the service’s agreed training plan.

The practical answer is that free online foster training may count as relevant prior learning, but it should not be relied upon as the complete preparation needed for approval. Use it to build your knowledge, retain evidence of what you have studied and ask the fostering service to assess how it fits with its own requirements.