Creating an Account

How do I request an account?

To join Respite Source, you'll need to request an account and have your membership be approved by Foster Source staff and your county or agency certification worker.

After reading through this help page, visit this link to apply for an account.

Who is eligible for an account?

To be eligible for a Respite Source account, you must meet the following qualifications.

• You are a resident of Colorado, USA
• You are a certified foster parent or a certified/non-certified kinship caregiver with a county or agency in Colorado
• You are able to provide contact information for you certification worker

How do I get my account approved?

Submit the form to request an account and verify your email to continue the process. A valid email address is required for your account to be reviewed and approved.

Once you verify your email address Foster Source will confirm your eligibility. To ensure the wellbeing of all the children in foster and certified-kinship homes, the requirements to be able to provide respite are specific, so please be patient while your account is being verified. This process will include Foster Source reaching out to your certification worker to verify your certification status.

When your account has been approved, you will receive an email notifying you that you can now log in and complete your profile. If your account is denied, you will be notified and (depending on the reasons for your account being denied) you may be able to reapply in the future.

How do I finish updating my account?

Once you have verified your email address and you’ve been notified that your account has been approved, you can log in and complete your account. You will not be able to use the majority of the features of the site until you complete your profile.

Some important things to note:

• Your Account information is private; your Profile (and contact) information is only accessible to other approved Respite Source users and Foster Source staff members
• It is your responsibility to keep information learned on Respite Source (whether through the forum or directly from another user) confidential
• Additionally, please note that any information you do share (though intended to be confidential) still has the potential to be shared outside of Respite Source.
• Only your preferred name will be shown publicly, so for example if your name is “John Smith”, you can set your preferred name to “John S.”, “J. Smith”, or even just “John.”
• You need to provide a profile picture to complete your account. Please ensure your face appears in your profile picture.
• You have the option to add a “Secondary Account Holder.” A secondary account holder could be your spouse or your partner. You will share a login, but both of your preferred names and provided contact information will be available on your profile.
• If you mark yourself as being unable to provide respite care, you will not show up in the respite search. Foster Source's hope is to have as many foster/kinship parents as possible providing respite, but we understand some parents may not be able to offer this. These parents are still able to search for respite when needed using our database. You can change this setting in the future if you decide to start offering respite care.
• While not all the fields on your profile are required, the more fields you fill out, the easier it is for parents with specific respite needs to find you. This means finding respite faster with less inquiries users will have to respond to. Please note that the availability (to provide respite) you initially enter on your profile can be updated in the future. If your availability to provide respite varies from week to week, feel free to note that on your profile so that other parents can reach out to you directly to inquire.

Searching for Respite

How do I find respite providers?

Only users who have indicated they are able to provide respite will appear here.

Profiles are automatically sorted by distance (from near to far). Distances are based on the address you provided when setting up your account. This address is not publicly visible. Distances are NOT based on your current location.

There is also a search bar available. This will be useful if you are looking for a specific name or keywords. The search bar searches only users' preferred names, their biographies, and the city that they have indicated that they are able to provide respite in.

How do I specify preferences for respite providers?

The feature you will likely find most useful is the ability to filter the results you see on the Find Respite page. Click the purple “Filter” button at the top of the page to open the filter panel and choose between options such as max distance, how many children you need to be cared for, specific days, etc.

Note that filters are additive, so putting too many filters will likely give you fewer and fewer results. For best results, choose a few options that are most important to you to filter by.

These filters are saved in your browser for future searches. If you have filters applied, they will be displayed as small boxes under the search bar at the top of the page.

If you need to reset your search, you can click the purple “clear filters” button.

Providing Respite Care

How do I make myself a provider?

Your account will only show up in respite search results if you have indicated that you are able to provide respite care. You can update this setting later on if you decide that you'd like to provide respite care.

You will be asked to provide some various information about your ability to provide care, all of which can be updated in the future if needed.

What is my availability?

Your availability is your baseline availability, as you indicated when you first completed your profile. Parents needing respite will use these times as a guideline during their search.

If your availability changes, you should update it as soon as possible in order to provide the most up-to-date information to other parents.

If your availability fluctuates or is flexible, feel free to note this in the bio section of your profile.

How do I connect with other caregivers to provide respite?

When you have indicated that you are able to provide respite, foster and kinship parents in need of respite care may contact you using your provided contact information. To keep things as civil and smooth as possible, we provide these suggestions for responding to these requests:

• To contact another user about providing respite, click the contact button at the bottom of their profile
• Though you are provided an email address and phone number, please use email as your primary method of contact unless it's an emergency
• Place the phrase “Respite Request” somewhere in the subject line of your email
• Be respectful in your email and/or response
• Just because a parent has indicated they are available during certain times on their profile does not guarantee they will be available for the time you request
• Be understanding of others' schedules when waiting for a response
• When receiving a request, make every effort to respond as soon as possible
• In your request, be as concise while still providing as many necessary details as possible regarding your situation in order to avoid unnecessary back-and-forth
• Important - all parties are required to get their respite arrangement approved by their county or agency certification worker