What is the difference between custody and placement?

Legal custody of children means that a parent is given the right to make major decisions like religion, school and medical for the minors. In other cases, there is joint legal custody. This is a situation where both parents will be involved in making major decisions. As mentioned above, religions, school and medical make the major decisions. Other types of major decisions could include, joining the military, consent to marry or obtaining a driver’s license. The court awards custody to one parent if they find the other one incapable of exercising all the above duties.

Placement, on the other hand, means that the parent will be allowed to spend time with the minors for an agreed amount of time. The judge has the best interest of the children while making this decision. The court makes this decision after considering very many factors, which vary with the case. divorce child custody and placement affect the children more than many couples understand hence the judge will make the decisions in favor of the children.

Does the court always award shared or equal placement?

Placement cases are not presumed or mandated. There is no preference for the parent’s placement. The court decides strict factors without favoring any of the parents. It is all done for the best of the children. The court makes sure that each parent gets maximum time with the children. The court does not use the sex of the parents as a factor in the placement decision. All decisions are made in the interest of the children. The kids can be placed with one parent, or there could be some shared placement.

Do we have a normal or standard placement schedule?

As mentioned above, we do not have presumptions to a specific type of schedule. The decision is arrived at after some factors are considered. Some of the factors considered include children ability to adjust, parents, work schedules, children schedules regarding school and other activities, parents residences and many more.

Many schedules start by alternating weekends, which majorly starts on Friday night until Sunday evening or Monday morning. If one of the parents is not available on weekends, they are given an overnight during the week. A placement is shared if one of the parents has 25% or more of the overnight placement time. Placement schedules vary with family needs.