A flag was raised on the Alberta legislature grounds on Monday in recognition of caregivers. The event marked the start of Foster and Kinship Caregiver Month. Alberta has approximately 1,500 licensed foster caregiver homes and 2,100 approved kinship care providers. Alberta’s children and family services minister spoke directly to them Monday morning: “You know better than anyone that caregiving is built on those everyday moments. While a child may not remember every appointment or every car ride, they’ll remember how you made them feel. They’ll remember the adult who showed up day after day after day and after day. The person or people who believed in them made them feel safe and helped them feel like they belonged. Those memories can shape a child’s future for a lifetime and beyond.” The president of the Alberta Foster and Kinship Association also spoke about child raising being a community responsibility. “A village doesn’t simply appear; it has to be built. Sometimes a caregiver needs professional advice or help navigating a system, and sometimes what they need is much simpler. The chance to share a story, a challenge, a moment of joy, a moment of embarrassment, a moment of fear,” Carmen Legge said, pointing specifically to rural communities with fewer resources. “If we believe that having a village makes caregivers stronger, then we need to be intentional about helping that village grow. It starts by making caregiver connection part of how we support caregivers, creating regular opportunities for them to meet, making it easier for new caregivers to connect with an experienced caregiver, and supporting the local and regional groups that are already bringing caregivers together.”
