What genders do you stay with in group homes??

Question

when you're in a group home, i know that they keep you in a room with only "your" gender. but is a group home with other genders too?

do group homes have multiple age groups in them? like any age, and if they do, do they only keep you in a room with usually your age group in it?

is a group home like an actual home? i mean, does it look like a home with like a TV and stuff in it? not that i care that if it does/doesn't have a TV i'm just using that as an example.

Answer 1

Hey.   Sometimes I don't understand why people answer questions when they don't know what the heck they are talking about....ARGH

Group homes can be small 6-8 kids or large.  They maybe all boys or all girls or mixed.  All the homes I stayed in were mixed, but the boys had their own bedroom and the girls had their own bedroom and the rules were that you could not go into another kids room.

The large homes have tons of kids.

A Residential Treatment Center (RTC) is VERY VERY different than a group home.  It is a group home setting, but the children are usually emotionally or behaviorally disturbed.  They can not stay in a normal group home setting.  Things are very different in an RTC.  If you need information about an RTC, ask another question, but I do not believe that you will be in an RTC.  So do not listen to the people who are talking about them as group homes.  They are different.

The homes generally have all ages, but the smaller homes tend to have age groups that are closer like 12-16, or 5-9.   The large group homes have ALL ages, from very little to older teens.  You may share a room with kids of all ages, especially if you are in a smaller group home where there is only one or two bedrooms.  But, they usually try and put you in a group home that is close to your age, like teenagers, or 5-9.  The larger homes they usually try to put you in a bedroom with kids near your age.  

In my experience I was in a small group homes and most of the kids were near my age.  I had 3 other kids in my room and they were all teenagers.  When I stayed in a large group home, I had 3 other kids in my room as well, but I was 10 and the kids were 8, 13, and 11.

A group home can be a "normal home."  These are usually the smaller ones where 6-10 kids live at a time.  It has exactly what a normal home has....kitchen, bedrooms, living room, etc.  It is a house that has staff people running it.  There are rules and you have chores, etc.  But there are no foster parents.  You will goto a regular school.

A group home call also be a large, building that does not look like a home, but has all the same things a home would, just MUCH bigger.  Usually the larger homes have several play rooms, bedrooms, kitchen, therapy rooms, playground, etc. Some have schools in them, but if you don't have any "educational problems" you would still probably goto a regular school.  In the large homes, there are also rules and you have chores.

They all have TVs, toys, books, etc.  No need to worry about that.  Although alot of the stuff is broken or really used.  (Nobody ever donates "new" stuff to foster kids.  Trust me.they donate games that are missing pieces, etc...but it is fine)

You can make some friends pretty easy because all the kids are in the same boat as you.  But warning, there can be a hierarchy of kids.  For example "older,lifers" might be in charge.  If you p**s them off, they can make your life miserable.  

Answer 2

Hi Sweetie,

I have seen some of your other questions and I feel for you in this strange and probably scary situation.  I can answer this question (at least from my own experience) as I have worked in three different group homes in the past.

All three were operated by the state that I live in and were for children who were removed from their homes due to abuse, neglect, or occasionally other reasons.

Two of the group homes were for "children" and one was called an "independent living dorm".  In the first two, we had kids that ranged from newborn to about age 14.  Every now and then we had a girl over 14 who came there with a child of her own.  Both the mother and the baby were considered to be in state custody, but it had been determined that they would stay together.  We didn't have very many teenagers, though.  Mostly, the kids were between 2 and 12.  

In the IL dorm, we had only girls and they were between 15 (not very common) and 20.  They, of course, were free to leave when they turned 18, but they very often chose to stay because they were in college or working -- or both -- and the state permitted them to live there (very inexpensively) until they were 20.  That only happened if they already lived there before 18, though.  In our dorm, all the staff were women.  There was a dorm for boys, too, in a different house.  All the staff at the boys dorm were men.

In the kids home, there were both girls and boys.  They always stayed in a room with only their own gender.  If we could, we tried to put one gender upstairs (2 rooms) and one downstairs (3 rooms), but that wasn't always possible.  We also had an entirely separate room just for babies (3 cribs).  Except for the babies (under 2 or 3 years old) all the ages stayed together.  We didn't have enough rooms to separate them all.

All three group homes were regular houses in regular neighborhoods.  Most of the really nearby neighbors knew that they were group homes but anyone just driving by would have no idea.  They don't have signs, floodlights, bars on the windows or any other weird stuff like that.  In our group homes there were 2 TVs.  Sometimes, we put a "little kids" video on in one room and let the older kids watch "regular" TV on the other one.

There were about 16 staff members that worked at each of the homes, and at least 2 were there all the time (sometimes 3) just like parents.  Most of our staff, though, were women.  We had 2 or 3 men at different times while I worked there.

I don't know where you are (and suggest you DON'T say where you are on Yahoo Answers) so I don't know how much my answer will be similar to or different from your experience when you go.  Some of your other questions have been about going into foster care.  Are you going to a group home first, then a foster home?  Or has that not been decided yet?  A lot of our kids (in the group home) went back home to their parent(s) after they'd been with us for a few weeks (sometimes more, sometimes less) rather than going into foster care.

I wish you the very best.  I hope you are treated well and taken good care of.  If it's safe and good, I hope you can go home sometime soon.

Take care!

  

Answer 3

There are both kinds.  Some have only one gender and some have both but housed separately.  In treatment there is only like 7 or 8 kids and it can be both sexes  

Answer 4

My boyfriend is in a boys home, group home, and its right around the corner, they have a TV room, where they can sit, they get to go outside. they get phone privileges, the ages range from 14 to 18, the younger ones have a cerfew of 10, and the 18 year old has a cerfew of 11 and has the bigger room. also hes been in there longer than the others. theres about 30 kids in there, and some have a small seperate room, and a few share a room, they of coarse have to do chores and everything, and most of the guards, are strict, but others arent. it depends.(:

also theres many different setup in other homes, thats just the one i know

Answer 5

Well i share a room with my sister and she's 29 but i'm ok with that we have a t.v, bed, 2 desks, computer and 2 wardrobes for each of us in our room.

Answer 6

Each one is different and it depends on  why you are there. The ones for kids who are truant , defiant etc tend to be more institutional like.  However there are group homes that you get your own room or share a room.  I know people who  work in a group homes.  The kids share a  room so just two to a room  There are boys and girls they do not group by age.  They have TV and there is all ways staff there.  They eat meals together and they take trips to do things especially in the summer.   There are kids from 12-17 there for multiple reasons.