Do you think if all private/non profit agenices started to assist with foster care adoption instead....?

jm1970

Foster Care is a very specialized, over burdened legal system that cannot take any more pressure at this time. There would be an even bigger backlog of children than there is now!

Children are in care for a long time for many reasons. One being we don't have homes for children of a certain age. People don't want them. I know, I have children I've searching for years for parents.

People want babies....any race baby.....then they want children under 3...any race..under 3....

Foster care is a necessary evil, but a very flawed system. It would be far better to develop a system for private adoptions with regulations and ethics specific to the needs of voluntary reliquishments.

Children who come from abusive, neglectful homes have very special needs and they need agencies and workers who are focused on those demands. We need parents who can deal with those demands.

The needs of birth parents who are considering adoption are very different from the needs of parents who are having children taken away from them, they need someone who is focused on their needs.

That is not to say that I don't care about all children, because I do.....but the infant is going to get adopted without me....I need to be focused on my 12 year old with LD/EMI and bedwetting issues.

We need a seperate, regulated system that is as closely monitored and trained as foster care, but not the same.

We had three children in my state die in foster care or in a home that adopted through foster care due to parental abuse or neglect....trust me...not perfect on my side of the tracks either!

julie j

Hi R,

Yes, I believe your thoughts are on the right track because every child does deserve a loving home and family. In the U.S., there are currently over 140,000 children waiting in foster care while there are over that number of prospective parents waiting for years on lists at agencies. That's senseless! Agencies know who the people are who want to be parents.

The common goal should be finding families for children who need them now, right? Let's start with that pool of people who already want to be parents and have already passed their home studies. Because there are various demographics of children in foster care, one possible consideration will be whether those prospective parents really want to be parents, or whether they really only want a newborn, white baby. If they broaden their idea of loveable children to include those who are a little older or those who are of other races, then yes, that should help reduce the number of children in foster care.

Another consideration is that some agencies might not be interested in helping foster children because that's not where the big money is. Adoption agencies are first and foremost, businesses. They are not social services, regardless of their tax status, and their primary motive is making money. It is far easier for them to do that by sticking with adoptions of white newborns. Regretfully, I believe they would be reluctant to participate without additional incentives for themselves.

Still, you have given us some things to think about. Hopefully others will take note of your idea as well. A final consideration would be who would be responsible? Would the govt. and agencies work together, split duties, merge, would one report to the other? As another poster suggested, if all adoptions went through the state in the first place, then there would be no need for adoption agencies. It has been done successfully in other countries for decades. That would also eliminate the problems of outrageous fees charged to adoptive parents, pre-birth matching, conflicts of interest, coersion, etc. Thanks for asking.

julie j
reunited adoptee

Gaia Raain

Our agency does foster adoption and all other kinds; international, infant, you name it. Since we're adopting through the foster care program, I didn't do any research into the other areas of adoption that our agency does until recently. Now that it's too late to go through DHS, I've learned that the way they deal with the other kinds of adoption fits pretty much with what any other agency does. So, I'd have to say that it doesn't really matter. Even if an agency adds foster adoption into the mix, they're still in it for the money. I don't know of an agency that does foster adoption exclusively; they wouldn't make enough money to keep the business open.

opedial

I think is all adoptions went through foster care, in fact had to go through foster care that it would streamline all issues in adoption. One regulated way to adopt? I like it.

HappyMomAnna

I do too...

My uncle was raised in an orphanage and was never adopted and he became an amazing man...

I also had a friend who came home on her 18th brithday and her things were packed in front of her foster home. I didn't know her then or as a child--I knew her at the end of her life when she died of complications of type 1 diabetes... She had been taken into foster care because her father was so upset she was diagnosed at age 6 he tried to overdose her--rather then suffer her whole life as he did....

Her story really impacted my feelings.... She died at age 43 and left behind a son who had no real family connection because his mother was an aged out foster child.

I think so many of the children who do age out end up repeating a cycle for lack of no real connections to anyone. It breaks my heart....
*

Lori

not everybody knows how to parent kids from the system and not all kids are able to handle being in a family - it isn't as easy as it sounds - it wouldn't be fair to a family that has been dealing w/ infertility and no children to have them parent a teenager that has all kinds of issues that they were not cut out to handle - the issue is more complex than a quick fix

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