The BCN Website is a vital source of information for people working on issues related to children who lack adequate family care. Searchable by region, country, or specific topics, the library contains over 8,000 resources, including research, policy, and programme resources related to the care and protection of  vulnerable children.

Through engagement with ReThink Orphanages a growing number of tourism and volunteer-sending organisations have moved away from relationships with orphanages. To build and sustain this movement, the Better Care Network is convening a task force of travel sector actors to both develop a model of good practice to support this process, and a framework for ethical volunteering and tourism to support children overseas. If you would like to find out more about this initiative, please contact rethink@bettercarenetwork.org

BCN and partners have convened, facilitated, or participated in several international and regional conferences reelated to the care and protection of children.

BCN and its partners are engaged in several advocacy initiatives aimed at the United Nations, including those below.

BCN and its partners are working to advocate for better collection and analysis of data on children’s living and care arrangements in order to allow countries to identify trends and patterns in girls’ and boys’ care, monitor changes to their situation, and respond accordingly to strengthen family care and prevent unnecessary placement in out of home care.

Taking the UN Guidelines as a framework, this free online course will help you gain insight into how the unnecessary placement of a child in alternative care can be prevented; how alternative care can constitute a suitable, positive experience for a child when it is necessary; and how children and young people who are leaving care can best be supported. Learn with alternative care specialists from CELCIS, UNICEF and the UN. An international inter-agency group, including Better Care Network, commissioned CELCIS, based in the University of Strathclyde, to develop the MOOC. The course is…

This presentation by Florence Martin, Director of Better Care Network, explains what the Tracking Progress Tool is, how it was developed, and how it can be used by actors working to reform or strengthen a country's care system to measure progress in the implementation of the UN Guidelines for the Alternative Care of Children. The Tracking Progress Tool is a free, web-based, interactive diagnostic and learning tool designed to enable national actors (governments, children’s service providers, NGOs, civil society, academics and others) to determine the extent to which their country has…

In 2014, the New York Working Group on Children without Parental Care and the Special Representative for the Secretary General (SRSG) on Violence Against Children (VAC) collaborated to initiate a series of regional expert consultations on children’s protection from neglect, abuse and exploitation against children in all care settings. These consultations aim to provide a platform for regional experts, from governments and civil society, to exchange promising practices, lessons learned and to identify progress and challenges in the implementation of the recommendations of the …

BCN has co-facilitated, and collaborated on, several inter-agency initiatives aimed at enhancing the implementation of the Guidelines for the Alternative Care of Children. These initiatives includes the Tracking Progress Initiative - which developed a strengths-based diagnostic tool to support those working on strengthening care systems at the country level to measure progress in the implementation of the Alternative Care Guidelines - and the development of a handbook entitled Moving Forward: Implementing the Guidelines for the Alternative Care of Children.