Calling all foster care experts/those with personal experience:

Well, my first question would be why is he being moved? Teenagers tend to be much harder to place than little kids. A nearly grown child whose been through who-knows-what can cause a lot of disruption for a family so there just aren't as many homes who will take teenagers as who will take the little kids. A group home would be a very common placement for a teenager. And then once he was placed, they probably wouldn't be eager to disrupt his placement and make him get used to yet another new living situation.

One reason I could think of that would make sense would be if one of his friends' families decided to step up and take him in. But once he was already in the system, the friend's parents would probably have to go through the classes and background check and everything to get certified as foster parents so they could take him in. It would take a few months and he'd have to stay in the group home in the meantime. Sometimes they might allow the family friends to take him in without getting certified but then that family wouldn't get the monthly stipend, clothing allowance, medical care and other benefits for the teenager that they'd be able to get if they got certified.

But if it's all the same to your story, you might make it easier on your research to just have him go directly to a foster home placement in the first place. Also, what I know of it would be in the U.S.

CPS groups children into levels of care, according to how much "extra" they need. They've changed it around some since I was involved with them, but for ex. let's say a foster/adoptive parent or group home that takes more or less regular kids without any big challenges is level 1-2. A child who had more significant problems would need to be placed in a group home or with a foster/adoptive parent who was licensed for a higher level of care than the usual basic deal.

Again, I don't remember all the details now and it's been changed around some but as a vague example, if this teenager was in a level 3-4 facility, he would have physical, emotional, or mental difficulties that would need people with that extra training and less kids per adult. CPS could not let a regular foster parent take that child in, they'd have to get the advanced certification first. The state also pays more per month per child for the ones with more intensive needs.

I forget what the highest numbered level of care is but that would be a child who had very serious extra needs, like say needed to be on a machine to be able to breathe, or had had so many suicide attempts that he/she had to be in a facility where she was watched every minute of the day or night.

But even a level 1-2 teenager in care who has had a rough life, can definitely be quite a handful and have assorted problems beyond what most of us would probably consider a regular, well adjusted teenager.

So, say your kid was in a regular group home with other teenagers. He could be there and have had hospitalizations for mental or behavioral problems, a stay at juvenile hall, and so on. (Oh that's another thing, kids can and do get their levels of care changed. For ex., if your kid did well in his level 3-4 facility for six months or so, it wouldn't be unusual at all that he'd then qualify for placement in a level 1-2 group home or regular foster home placement).

Maybe the woman who wants to take him in is a friend of his family and decides she wants to help, or she could be a teacher, minister, or nurse who got to know him through her job, or just someone who for some reason decides she wants to take in him in particular, or one or more foster teens in general, rather than this particular child.

Her reasons might add more interest to your story. For example, maybe she has this interest because she had been a foster child herself at one time. I was in foster/adoptive certification classes with a couple who were there because they wanted to take in their teenage daughter's friend who was in the system. Another couple wanted to take in three kids who were somehow related to them but if they got certified, they'd qualify for the money to help raise the kids, which at the time would have been like $1,500 a month plus their medical insurance and other benefits. If they had just taken them in without getting certified, they wouldn't have the state into their business nearly as much but they also wouldn't get the extra financial help. I believe the only difference with a single foster parent as opposed to a couple is that they may not be allowed to have as many children as a home with two parents. It is (or used to be) six kids total for a couple, including your own children. And, I believe the number was four total for a single parent. Sometimes a single parent home is preferred, say for a child who has been abused by an adult of the other gender and fears them or whatever.

Maybe you could just go ahead and write your story, and then have some of us with some familiarity with the system look it over and tell you our ideas of how to correct anything you might have put in it that wouldn't be likely to really happen.

Also, imo sometimes the best way to get around a lot of the technical details is to just not mention many of them. I think it would be pretty easy for you to swing having this happen without explaining much of how it happened and the readers would buy it. The technical details aren't all that interesting anyway, imo. Good luck with it.

One other idea is looking up some nonfiction books about teenagers in foster care. That might give you some great ideas for authentic details to add.

I had jobs/internships at various foster care homes. The level 1-2 homes were where the kids needed more or less regular parenting, which of course does not mean they didn't have any problems. But they attended the regular neighborhood schools, were allowed to be in activities in the larger community, got to hang out with their friends, go out on dates (if they were over sixteen), and so on.

The level 3-4 group home I was in was much different. The kids had to ask to have a razor to shave with and return it right away, for example. They had to have adult eyes on them at all times, (well, most of them could go to the restroom alone but other than that) including leaving the doors open when they were sleeping. They went to school at the group home facility. And there was a nurse on site and a psychiatrist came in a couple of times per week. They had very little freedom. Some of them were there because they had serious behavior problems and couldn't be trusted to not be watched, whereas others had significant physical health problems, brain damage, etc. For ex., one girl there had serious mental impairment from sniffing inhalants. Chances are, after she turned of legal age, she'd then be transferred to an adult facility. She wasn't expected to recover significantly. (as a side note, it was lovely to see how some of the toughest girls around looked after that one like she was their treasured baby sister). Also, there as a "cell" in each cottage, a bedroom that had been emptied and had bars on the doors, used to keep a teenager safe when they got out of control.

But sometimes the ones there for behavioral reasons would be sent to a level 1-2 facility after a period of improved behavior/functioning. And sometimes kids from the 1-2 level group homes around town would be sent to the level 3-4 facility for a while if they were having too many problems for the level of care offered at a regular placement.

If that helps...

A sixteen-year-old may or may not be well informed about this. It all depends on how sheltered their life has been. If they are from a typically disrupted family (where most foster children come from) they will likely have some idea even if this is their first placement. they would have heard from other kids from troubled backgrounds. These families are usually poor and poor people tend to hear about these things. However, if the kid is relatively well-off and sheltered, they probably think that kids live with their family or go to an orphanage, like many kids. The whole system would be news to them and very confusing.

For the foster parents and case workers, the situation depends on the individual case. Most teenagers who go into foster care are very troubled kids with a lot of traumatic past. They will often have a lot of risky and problematic behaviors and attitudes picked up as survival tools in the difficult circumstances of their lives. Teens are very hard to place in foster care and foster families who accept them can be a bit eccentric. I know a wonderful woman who accepts teens as foster kids. She is a mountain lady and can easily rope a cow from horseback, build a house, fix its roof, cut wood and smile the whole time. She deals with very troubled teenage boys. She is short, stout and extremely physically strong. She's also a volunteer firefighter and wilderness emergency rescue worker. She's just a bit intimidating to anyone and quite the real-life character. Most foster parents who deal with the really tough teen set tend to be strange in some way or another. Some of them are simply fanatically religious and out to save souls but they don't tend to do well with the very troubled teens and that can be short-lived.