Hi, my name is Sue Stepney. I am a foster carer and foster for Peterborough City Council since 2016, prior to this I was a foster carer for an independent foster care agency. I have 3 grown up children and 5 grandchildren.

I foster alongside my husband and we have experience of fostering young people with disabilities, teenagers, siblings, parent and child and babies. I absolutely love fostering and wouldn’t think of doing anything else. Apart from babies and parent and child who tend to be time limited foster placements we do tend to provide long term foster placements. I of our young people has been with us for 10 another 5 and another 2 have been with us for 4 years. Our young people are part of our family.

I am also a recruitment ambassador and a regional recruitment ambassador for Peterborough Fostering services. This is a role I enjoy very much as I love talking about fostering. The role involves promoting fostering, talking to new and prospective carers about fostering and what they may expect when and if they become Foster Carers.

I am very excited to be part of a pilot scheme in Peterborough called the Mockingbird program. The Mockingbird program was designed by a Foster Carer in the USA and has been in the UK since 2015 and developed in the UK by Fostering Network. The program is designed to provide support for both foster carers and the young people who live with them.