5 Resources For Anyone Interested In Adoption
Adoption is a significant and often challenging event in the lives of both parents and children, and requires great sensitivity, patience, and care to undertake. For individuals and families adopting kids in need, the resources listed here will help make the process easier to understand and successfully navigate. This video was made with Ezvid Wikimaker.
5 Great Resources Focused on Child Adoption
| Name | About |
|---|---|
| Gladney Center for Adoption | Provides loving homes for children, a caring environment for birth parents, supportive services for families and adoptees, and assistance to orphans and vulnerable children throughout the world |
| Amanda Baden | A scholar and counselor whose research and clinical practice focus on adoption triad members, transracial/international adoption issues, racial and cultural identity, and multicultural counseling competence |
| Adoptive Families Association of BC | Provides programs for families, children, and youth, and helps find families for the hundreds of children and youth in the care of the Ministry of Children and Family Development who are waiting for a permanent home |
| Children's Bureau | Private, nonprofit leader in preventing child abuse and neglect and treating children who have suffered |
| The National Center on Adoption and Permanency | Provides a broad range of information, resources, consultation, and multidisciplinary services relating to adoption, foster care, and child welfare |
The Services of Adoptive Families Association of BC
Adoption Rates in the United States
According to the U.S. Department of Health & Human Services
| Year | Children in Foster Care | Children Adopted |
|---|---|---|
| 2008 | 750,000 | 55,300 |
| 2009 | 700,000 | 57,200 |
| 2010 | 669,000 | 53,500 |
| 2011 | 643,000 | 50,900 |
| 2012 | 635,000 | 52,000 |
| 2013 | 638,000 | 50,800 |
| 2014 | 650,000 | 50,700 |
| 2015 | 669,000 | 53,600 |
| 2016 | 685,000 | 57,200 |
| 2017 | 691,000 | 59,400 |
Moving Books About Adoption & Foster Care
How Children's Bureau Prevents Child Abuse
In Depth
For children and families alike, adoption is complex, both practically and emotionally. Fortunately, there are a number of organizations that serve to guide families through the process and to provide resources for a lifelong journey. This list, presented in no particular order, looks at organizations and individuals offering services for adoptive parents and adoptees.
At #1, Gladney Center for Adoption places children with adoptive families. The organization sees its mission as improving the lives of children, families, and birth parents. It was founded in 1887 in Fort Worth, Texas by Methodist minister I.Z.T. Morris as the Texas Children's Home and Aid Society, and was later renamed after pioneering superintendent Edna Gladney.
Gladney coordinates domestic infant, international, and foster adoption. Its global programs focus on China, Colombia, and Taiwan. The group's Pregnancy Hotline service appeals to expectant mothers. Gladney's advocacy arm promotes what it calls "pro-child" laws and regulations at the state and national levels. Training and education programs offer guidance to first-time adoptive families. One of these initiatives provides medical professionals, counselors, social service advocates, and community members with cutting-edge continuing education.
One of these initiatives provides medical professionals, counselors, social service advocates, and community members with cutting-edge continuing education.
#2 on the list is the work of Amanda Baden on transracial adoption. She's a counseling psychologist with a therapy practice in Manhattan. Herself adopted from Hong Kong and raised in a transracially adoptive family, she has performed extensive research and writing on the subject, as well as on racial "form" and cultural identity, and multicultural counseling competence.
As a professional consultant, Baden provides workshops and trainings to various professional organizations, adoption agencies, educational institutions, parent groups, adoptee groups, conference planners, and filmmakers. She writes a column for the online magazine Gazillion Voices, making available findings from her research. She has also served as a consultant and interviewee in a number of films on adoption.
Our #3 entry is the Adoptive Families Association of BC, which offers a variety of programs for families, children, and youth in British Columbia. It was founded in 1977 by a small group of adoptive parents that first gathered in person and later began publishing a newsletter designed to break the silence around adoption. It has since grown into a large regional organization with offices across the province.
It has since grown into a large regional organization with offices across the province.
AFABC's educational initiatives are intended to assist and strengthen families throughout the adoption experience. These include classes mandatory for adoptive families in BC, as well as webinars, online workshops, and presentations on the basics of the process. The group also offers a range of support services, such as discussion groups, and events. It also maintains a team of support workers.
In the #4 spot, Children's Bureau was founded in 1904 by Mrs. E.K. Foster, a Los Angeles community leader, and a group of volunteers who shared a concern for the plight of vulnerable children. Through advocacy and services, the private nonprofit works to prevent child abuse and neglect and to treat those who have suffered from it.
In its programs for children and families, Children's Bureau aims to reduce risk factors and increase opportunities, offering the tools needed to raise happy, productive children. These include foster care and adoption initiatives that are designed to help at-risk kids stay in their communities. The group connects foster youth, including many sibling sets, to so-called "resource parents" and provides resources to both.
These include foster care and adoption initiatives that are designed to help at-risk kids stay in their communities.
Concluding our list at #5, The National Center on Adoption and Permanency is designed to be a "one-stop" national organization that provides a broad range of multidisciplinary services and resources relating to adoption, foster care, and child welfare. The group is led by prominent figures in the field, including former Donaldson Institute President Adam Pertman and former Kinship Center CEO Carol Biddle.
NCAP's work spans a range of skills and disciplines, with the group involved in programs, projects, trainings, presentations, consultations, and other initiatives with governments and organizations across the country. The overarching mission is to move policy and practice from a "child placement" model to one that focuses on "family success."
