Achieving Permanency

By Bethany Leas and Erika Schmitt Originally published in Adoptalk 2021: issue 1. Adoptalk is a benefit of NACAC membership. Bethany Leas is the Regional Director of Family Support Services at The Children’s Institute of Pittsburgh. Erika Schmitt is the Director of Adoption and Permanency Services at The Children’s Home & Lemieux Family Center, and… Read more

By Mary Boo, NACAC executive director Originally published in Adoptalk 2020: issue 3. Adoptalk is a benefit of NACAC membership.   For federal fiscal year 2019, the Adoption and Foster Care Analysis and Reporting System (AFCARS) found that than 66,035 children and teens were adopted with public agency involvement in the US—the highest number ever… Read more

From Adoptalk 2019, Issue 2; Adoptalk is a benefit of NACAC membership.  By Sharon Kaplan Roszia and Allison Davis Maxon Sharon Kaplan Roszia and Allison Davis Maxon have co-authored Seven Core Issues in Adoption and Permanency: A Comprehensive Guide to Promoting Understanding and Healing in Adoption, Foster Care, Kinship Families and Third Party Reproduction, which… Read more

From Adoptalk 2018, Issue 4; Adoptalk is a benefit of NACAC membership.  The number of children and teens in US foster care and the number of youth adopted from foster care rose in 2017, according to the Adoption and Foster Care Analysis and Reporting System (AFCARS).  Every fiscal year, AFCARS collects data on all the children in foster care and… Read more

From Adoptalk 2018, Issue 3; Adoptalk is a benefit of NACAC membership The National Quality Improvement Center for Support and Preservation (QIC-AG) is a five-year, federally funded project designed to promote permanence when reunification is no longer a goal and to improve adoption and guardianship preservation and support. The QIC-AG is built on the premise that child welfare agencies need… Read more

From Adoptalk 2018, Issue 2; Adoptalk is a benefit of NACAC membership Sierra Forever Families’ Destination Family program finds and supports adoptive families for children in foster care. Without specialized permanency services such as this, many more youth would age out of the system without the support they need. With a focus much broader than… Read more

The Children’s Bureau, in collaboration with its information service, Child Welfare Information Gateway, and AdoptUSKids, just announced the launch of the 2017 National Adoption Month website! Every November, the field honors the families who have adopted, the families considering adoption, and the adoption professionals who make it possible for children and youth to find their… Read more

AdoptUSKids has recently published new public narrative-writing guidelines developed to help workers craft compelling narratives that protect the safety, privacy, and dignity of children. The principle behind these guidelines is that information about children should be shared on a continuum, with positive, descriptive information in the public profile that is available to all and information… Read more

This informative webinar is designed for anyone parenting or providing services for LGBTQ children and youth in foster care, adoption, or relative care. Included is an overview of what we know about: LGBTQ youth in out of home care the impact of family rejection their struggle for inclusion and safety when in care lack of… Read more

In the late 1990s child welfare leaders began to challenge the belief that attaining permanent families for preteens and teens was an impossible goal, and model specialized youth permanency services were developed across the country. Sadly many of the projects fell into disuse as initial funding sunset. In many cases, counties and states failed to… Read more

At NACAC, we believe that every child and youth needs and deserves a permanent, loving family. Sadly, each year more than 20,000 youth age out of foster care without being connected to a legally permanent family. The articles below are designed to help child welfare workers and administrators consider how to make permanency a reality… Read more

“You are never too old to be adopted,” said one young woman during an interview for a recently completed study on successful adolescent adoptions. “It´s the most important thing that happened to me,” said another adoptee. “I got a family and found love. I have everything one hopes for. I fit in a family.” These… Read more

  Janice Expecting a child who has lived through a disrupted adoption to believe in the permanency of a new parental commitment is a very tall order. Think about it: How many adults get hurt in a relationship and then walk confidently into the next one with an open heart and mind? Each time we… Read more

Inside and Outside There was a time when my identity was that of an abused, neglected, and abandoned foster child. Sometimes I sense that the same lonely little girl still resides somewhere deep inside. However, I’m relieved to now have a cluster of other, more positive, identities: social worker, wife, mother, foster mother, adoptive mother, writer, and advocate… Read more

by Catherine Sanders I came into the system in 2008 when I was 13 years old. At that time, my case plan was reunification. I knew from the start that I didn’t want to return to my biological mother. I constantly told my workers and everyone else involved in the case that, but no one… Read more

Lexie entered foster care when she was 15 years old and aged out without finding a foster or adoptive family. She has become a vocal advocate for finding families for all children and youth in care. The article below is adapted from remarks Lexie gave at a briefing on Capitol Hill in September 2014 titled… Read more

In 1999, the California Department of Social Services and Consortium for Children partnered to launch an innovative new program—Permanency Planning Mediation. The partners were looking for an effective way to use openness to shorten a child’s time in foster care by avoiding costly and time-consuming contested termination of parental rights hearings while also helping maintain… Read more

From Summer 2012 Adoptalk   According to the 2012 AFCARS report, close to 84,000 Hispanic or Latino children were in care at the end of fiscal year 2011. About 22 percent (almost 23,000) of those children were waiting to be adopted. Of the 50,516 children who found adoptive families in 2011, 21 percent (10,757) were… Read more

Think back to when you were leaving high school and starting college. What did you do in the summer? Attend cookouts and other events with your family? Sleep in and hang out with friends? Work to earn money for school? What about the 20,000 youth in foster care who age out each year. How do… Read more