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Adoption From State Care
Each year thousands of children are adopted from state care, while others come into the system. Florida strives to maximize the number of children adopted from foster care by pairing eligible children with parents willing to take the responsibility of bringing them into their home.
Why Is This Important?
The Florida Department of Children and Families is one of the state agencies charged with assisting abused and neglected children. Florida also offers the Office of Adoption and Child Protection within the Governor's Office under the direction of the State's Chief Child Advocate.
Florida provides support services to children and their families, and, in some cases, by providing a place outside of the home for children to live while their family problems are resolved. If after providing the family services specific to meet their needs, it is determined that it is not in the child's best interest to be reunified with his or her family, adoption becomes the goal by which the child is afforded an opportunity for a permanent, committed home. Adoption is a legal action that transfers all parental rights to adoptive parents, making the adopted child a legal member of the new family with all the rights and privileges of a biological child.
Most children waiting to be adopted are school-aged or in a sibling group that needs to stay together. Many have emotional disabilities; others have physical, mental or developmental disabilities, and they suffer from separation and loss. In the United States, there are over 120,000 children in foster care waiting to be adopted; 45 percent of the children living in foster care and who wait to be adopted come from minority cultures. Nearly half of the children waiting to be adopted are between the ages of six and 12 (A Child is Waiting, Dave Thomas Foundation for Adoption, 2004). All need the love of a permanent family, a 'forever family.'
Adoptive parents of special needs children are special people. They possess the gift of being able to open their hearts and homes to children in need of safety, love and nurturing, and they do so as a life-long commitment. Successful adoptive families have a sense of humor, true acceptance of a child's differences; the ability to measure in small steps and a firm belief in commitment.
How Is Florida Doing?
Adoptions from state foster care continue to increase. During fiscal year 2004-2005, adoptions from foster care totaled 2,563. Two years later that total increased by 20 percent, topping 3,000.
The last two fiscal years have witnessed two new records for adoptions. Fiscal year 2007-08 recorded 3,674 finalized adoptions, while the new record of 3,776 was set in 2008-2009. In comparison, the 1997-98 totals barely topped 1,500.
With the mandates of Adoption and Safe Families Act of 1997 and the increased sharing of information through adoption exchange web sites, the foster care population decreases and adoptions of special needs children increase. The next challenge facing the child welfare system is to ensure adoptive families have the support they need to raise their children to healthy adulthood and to prevent adoption disruptions.
Many adoptive families will manage the challenges of raising a child with special needs without state assistance, however, others will need additional assistance to care for special needs children. The Department of Children and Families is committed to constantly improve services and support for these special forever families. As an example, the Department is expanding community outreach for partners to assist families that have adopted large sibling groups.
Scorecard
What Influences Adoption From State Care?
Finding a temporary placement for children that must be removed from their homes of origin is only the first step in the journey for many children. Some are able to be returned home because the family has accepted and benefited from services and programs available and provided to rectify the circumstance that brought the child into care. However, for some children, returning home is not a possibility, despite all efforts. The negative effects of growing up in foster care have been recognized and the days of children living in foster homes for entire childhoods are gone. Finding an alternative permanent family, a 'forever family' for children in foster care who cannot return to their homes of origin is a major focus of the department.
The Adoption and Safe Families Act of 1997 (ASFA) mandates that states ensure permanency for foster children and provides financial incentives for states to increase the number of adoptions from foster care. ASFA eliminated long-term foster care as a permanency goal, reduced permanency planning timelines and directed states to engage in concurrent planning activities for children in foster care. According to the Adoption and Foster Care Analysis and Reporting, nationwide, there were 50,362 adoptions of children from the public child welfare system in Federal Fiscal Year 2003, as opposed to only 27,761 children adopted in Federal Fiscal Year 1996, the year that ASFA was enacted.
Concurrent planning, which the department actively promotes and engages in, involves the pursuing family reunification AND another permanency goal (such as adoption) at the same time, in case that reunification cannot be achieved in a safe and timely manner. Because of these changes in policy and practice, the number of children adopted have increased substantially.
What Is the State's Role?
The Florida Department of Children and Families is responsible for the safety, permanency and well-being of children in foster care, including those waiting to be adopted. Some of the initiatives the Department engages in to meet this charge include:
Establishment and administration of an adoption program for special needs children to be carried out by the Department or by a contract with a licensed child-placing agency.
Offer an approval process for persons interested in adopting special needs children. The approval process includes orientation; preparation course (The Model Approach to Partnership in Parenting or MAPP; home study: final approval; match; placement supervision; and finalization.
Partnerships with our community-based care providers and other local community organizations for the purpose of adoption promotion (such as One Church One Child) and post-adoption services provision (support groups, counseling, workshops and seminars).
Collaboration with AdoptUsKids, sponsored by the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, Administration for Children and Families, which allow prospective adoptive parents to view some of the thousands of children who are available for adoption in the United States, including Florida; connects licensed prospective adoptive parents to the caseworkers responsible for individual children listed on the site; connects prospective parents who are new to the process of adoption and/or foster care to state-based teams who can support them through the licensing process; and provides basic information on adoption and foster parenting.
Collaboration with Florida's Adoption Information Center (daniel), a clearinghouse in every area of adoption, which as a free service, provides adoption information and referral services to adoptive parents, adult adoptees, birth relatives, pregnant women and professionals.
Maintenance of an adoption assistance program which includes a monthly subsidy payment to adoptive families who qualify; medical subsidy to help cover the costs of treating physical, mental or emotional conditions that existed prior to the adoption; non-recurring expenses payments and adoption benefits for state employees.
In addition to serving as Director of the Office of Adoption and Child Protection, the Chief Child Advocate also directs the activities of Florida's Children and Youth Cabinet. The Cabinet, consisting of state leaders from government and the private sector, works with state and local agencies and groups to promote the interests of children around the state. The Florida Children and Youth Cabinet was established in 2007.
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