The Family Approach

It’s an undisputed fact that the best place to raise a child is in a family. But all over Europe, there’s a shortage of foster families for those children who can’t live with their biological families. In a house beside a lake in Germany, three youth workers step in as caregivers for five children in a therapeutic residential home. They work tirelessly shift after shift: speaking to guardians, parents and youth services; setting common goals and appointments while all the time trying to show the children what a family-like atmosphere can feel like. We spent a year following them and the children they care for.

Cooking, washing, shopping, as well as shuttling the kids to school and activities are all part of their daily workday, along with listening, comforting, cuddling on the sofa, movie nights and reading bedtime stories. What was once the task of the whole village, now falls to a complex apparatus of child and youth services. The caregivers aren’t trying to replace mum and dad, but they do everything they can to create a home for children. The youth workers commit themselves tirelessly: they speak to guardians, parents and youth services; they document, organise, set common goals and set up appointments – and are often disappointed when these aren’t kept to. It all seems like fighting against windmills, at the limits of an overwhelmed system.

These professions are vital to society, yet the unique and challenging work of the specialists, their inexhaustible commitment to the welfare of the kids, usually remains invisible. This film shines a light on those in the background who work day after day to give the children what they need the most: safety, and someone who’s on their side.