the payment rate varies from state to state, and it differs if it's a straight foster care parent or if the home is designated a "group home".
when i supervised an fc unit i was amazed to learn how little the majority of foster parents received.
in california the state sets the rate and it's roughly based on what a person would receive for a child on straight public assistance. back then it was around $320 per month, it's not a whole lot more now (the amount people recive for public assistance has gone down over the years and then did'nt get cola's for a long time). foster kids did'nt get food stamps unless the foster family also met the eligibility criteria-of the thousands of cases in my unit i think we had less than 5 receiving food stamps. i don't know if they got wic b/c that was administered by another agency. they got medicaid which was good, except some fp's found out pretty fast that not all doctors accept it and they might have to put in some significant travel time to get the kiddos to the doctors that did-and medicaid does'nt pay for otc stuff, so any medical/dental items of need not covered by medicaid was expected to come out of the monthly payment.
we did clothing allowance once per year-$200, and whoever had the child at that point got the allowance.
a person might get a higher rate if there were "dtp" issues (difficulty to place). there were special extra monies if kids could'nt toilet themselves, care for their own hygene, and things like that but it was'nt astrinomical money (esp. when you consider the tasks you had to be doing for the child in order for them to qualify for it).
fc is paid on a daily rate, not a monthly-and it's paid after the fact. so let's say a child comes into a foster home with no clothing, no hygene items-and in the case of a non toileting child-no diapers. the foster parent has to get all the items for their needs, and then provide for their housing, food, transportation... then say the child is moved to a new home 15 days later (can be a variety of reasons none of which have to do with the child or fp). the foster parent has put out likely hundreds of dollars but they will only be paid for the 15 days the child was there (day of arrival through the day before departure), and they won't get that until the month after that child was there, those checks were often less than $175.00. we had lots of foster parents realize that not only were they never going to break even, they spent way more than the small amount the state allowed to be paid.
as for tuition for college-i'm surprised any state would cover this. fc traditionaly ends when a child turns 18, so the fc kid (now legaly an adult) loses all their eligibility to any funds which means allot of them while still in high school end up homeless and end up dropping out. the independant living programs that some regions have done a good job implementing has helped to some extent, but with the current economy i have to imagine it's even tougher now for these kids
as far as any extras-they could ask for a campership referral, and if some camps had donated slots we might be able to get a child in for a week during the summer (thousands of applicants, handful of slots). target used to donate some backpacks with school supplies but those were generaly gone by the end of september (donated at the begining of september each year). no special funds for christmas-they could see if they could get the child listed with toys for tots or those giving tree things.
You tell me if she isn't using the foster system as a means of a paycheck.
The payment will be tuition only. At Salem State, the tuition is less than $40.00 per credit, but the fees not included in the state paid tuition are $245.00 per credit. Maybe this will be different when she attends because I do see this question on the FASFA, but I am not sure. I know that I would not sign the "guardianship contract" until they included at least tuition. Oh, and the reason I have not adopted her is because if I did, she would no longer be eligible for Mass Health, and thus the therapy she is also entitled too. 
