By Robert Tapsfield, chief executive of the Fostering Network (THE GUARDIAN, 16/05/06):
Most children and young people can rely on the constant support of their parents while they are growing up. Parents who look after them, comfort them when things go wrong, praise them when they do something well, support them with their schoolwork, and encourage them to achieve their goals in life.But this is unfortunately not the case for every child. Across England there are over 60,000 children and young people in care whose families are, for a wide variety of reasons, unable to offer them all of this support. Two-thirds of these children live with foster families.
Yet the system that should be helping these children to achieve their potential is all too often letting them down.
A survey by the Fostering Network, released to coincide with this month's Foster Care Fortnight, found that 47% of looked-after children in the UK had experienced at least one change of school, in addition to expected age-related moves, since coming into care.
One in five of those who responded had experienced two or more additional changes of school, with one in 20 moving schools at least four times.
Children coming into care have a hard enough time finding their feet without having to cope with a school move. And for those who get moved time and time again, it is hardly surprising that they fail to match the achievements of children from more stable backgrounds.
Only 11% of looked-after children in England achieved five GCSEs at grades A* to C in 2005, compared with 56% of all children, while less than 5% of care leavers go on to university. These poor outcomes are mirrored in Northern Ireland, Scotland and Wales.
The Fostering Network believes that the shortage of foster carers - more than 10,000 across the UK - is one of the key factors in these poor educational outcomes.
The shortage leads to children living miles away from their friends and families, being split up from their brothers and sisters, and, most worryingly, being moved between foster families - the latest figures show that 15% of looked-after children over 10 have had three or more placements in the past 12 months.
It is these frequent moves that all too often mean a change of school, making it hard for children to achieve academically, and also making it hard to make and maintain relationships.
In an attempt to tackle this damaging shortage of foster carers, the Fostering Network is once again co-ordinating Foster Care Fortnight.
The nationwide campaign aims to raise awareness of fostering and to recruit more foster carers.
A wider pool of carers would enable local authorities to find the right foster family for more children, meeting their needs in terms of culture, religion, language, location and interests.
And it is when good matches are made that foster carers are able to offer children stability, and to make a real and lasting difference in their lives.
But while Foster Care Fortnight helps to highlight the shortage of foster carers and encourage people to come forward, a two-week campaign once a year is not enough.
In order to transform outcomes for looked-after children, we need to see sustained investment in fostering from the government, and a commitment from local authorities to provide foster carers with the resources and support they need to do their jobs.
Fostering services that are prepared to pay and support their foster carers properly have shown that it is possible to recruit the number of foster carers needed, but unfortunately many still have to learn this lesson.
The Fostering Network is therefore calling on the governments of the UK to provide sufficient funding to allow local authorities to implement allowances that cover the full cost of fostering, a fee structure that pays foster carers for their work, a framework for training foster carers, and support systems that enable them to care for vulnerable children.
Being taken into care can be traumatic for a child, but this does not mean that their potential should be left unfulfilled.
Despite the depressing statistics, there are many success stories of children in foster care - indeed, with a theme of fostering brighter futures, this year's Foster Care Fortnight also celebrates what many fostered children have achieved and continue to achieve.
And with the continued hard work and commitment of foster carers, and improvement of their fostering services, more and more of society's most vulnerable children can look forward to brighter futures and a happier life.