Duke Endowment Awards Grant to Thompson For NC Foster Care Homes Expansion

CHARLOTTE, North Carolina – Thompson Child & Family Focus (Thompson), Charlotte’s leading human services

organization, was recently awarded a three-year grant of $484,168 by the Trustees of The Duke Endowment to expand

foster care in three eastern North Carolina Counties - New Hanover, Brunswick and Pender. Thompson will grow needed

foster home capacity to meet the increased needs due to the opioid epidemic and what many are predicting to be a

spike in underreported child abuse reports due to COVID-19.

With this funding, Thompson will replicate its proven foster care model in eastern North Carolina using

Together Facing the Challenge, the evidence-informed, affordable, sustainable model to equip foster parents in

providing trauma-informed care to the youth in their homes. Key activities include staff training, foster parent

recruitment and training, and ongoing data collection and program monitoring.

Thompson has decades of experiencing in working not only in the therapeutic foster care realm but also in providing

comprehensive, wraparound services including family education, mental health, medication management and intensive

case management. Thompson has grown its foster care programming statewide to over 200 foster homes and is

expected to grow beyond 300 licensed homes in the coming three years across North Carolina.

“Thompson has a track record of building capacity for therapeutic foster homes, and we are pleased to support their

evidence-informed model as it expands into eastern North Carolina,” said Tamika Williams, Associate Director of the

Endowment’s Child and Family Well-Being program area.

“We know there is a great need for foster care in eastern North Carolina for some of the community’s most traumatized

and challenging youth who have been impacted by the opioid crisis and other adverse childhood experiences,” said Matt

Simon, Chief Program Officer at Thompson. “We are incredibly excited and humbled to partner with The Duke

Endowment to ensure that even more youth are supported in stable foster homes.”

You can positively impact the lives of foster children - learn more about becoming a foster parent by contacting Jennifer

Stout, Statewide Director of Recruitment & Licensing at jstout@thompsoncff.org or call her at 828-447-5720.


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