November is National Adoption Awareness Month.
If you'd like more information on how to foster or adopt a child, please see the links on the right side of this page. The Dave Thomas Foundation has excellent information on how your family can help a child waiting for a home. Here are some facts about foster care:
•Children enter the foster care system through no fault of their own. As victims of abuse, neglect and/or abandonment, they are removed from their home because their birth family is unable or unwilling to provide a safe environment for them.
•More than 129,000 children in the U.S. foster care system are available for adoption. Their parent’s legal rights have been permanently terminated and children are left without a family.
•Children often wait five or more years to be adopted, can move three or more times in foster care and are frequently separated from siblings. More than half of these children are nine years of age or older.
•Each year, more than 20,000 children available for adoption turn 18 and leave the foster care system without a family.
•Adopting from foster care is affordable. Most child welfare agencies cover the costs of home studies and court fees, and provide post-adoption subsidies. Thousands of employers offer benefits for employees who adopt and adoption tax credits are available to most families.
•Every child is adoptable. Many children in foster care have special needs. All of them deserve the change to grow up in a safe, loving, permanent home. Post-adoption resources are available.
•Adopting from foster care is permanent. Once a child is adopted out of foster care, the birth parents cannot attempt to claim them or fight in court for their return.
Every child deserves a family.