[ Browse by Service Category : Individual and Family Support Services : Sub-Topics of Adoption Services (9) ]
Adoption Counselling and Support
Programs that provide guidance and support for people who have adopted a child or are involved in the process of adopting a child.
Adoption Evaluation/Placement
Programs that assess the needs and capabilities of children who have been relinquished for adoption, compile the children's social and medical histories, make arrangements for care and supervision of the children prior to placement, evaluate prospective adoptive applicants including a review of adoptive home studies, if available, and select and approve prospective adoptive homes.
Adoption Information/Referrals
Programs that provide information about the different types of adoption that are available as options and the requirements and procedures for adopting another individual for birth parents, adoptive parents and people who have been adopted. Included are programs that facilitate the adoption process by compiling information about children who are available for adoption in sharable formats such as photo albums, newsletters, video tapes or media campaigns (e.g., newspaper stories or television segments) that feature a particular adoptable child; and arranging activities such as picnics where prospective adoptive parents and children can meet informally. Also included are programs that provide referrals to organizations that offer adoption-related services a family might need.
Adoption Information Release Forms
Programs that maintain statements submitted by birth parents and adult birth siblings of their consent or denial of consent to the release of identifying information to a child who was placed for adoption or the child's direct descendents. Statements may be made available to adoption agencies, probate courts and court-appointed confidential intermediaries who are responding to requests from adult adoptees or their direct descendents for information about their birth families.
Adoptive Parent/Child Search
Programs that help individuals who were relinquished for adoption as children to locate their birth parents and/or assist birth parents to locate the children they once placed for adoption.
Specialized Adoption Programs
Programs that specialize in handling adoptions for specific populations (e.g., children with special needs, foreign-born infants/children, or adoptions in which the race/cultural background of the child and the adopting parents are different); and/or adoptions in which there are arrangements for exchange of information and contact between birth families and adoptive families prior to the adoption and/or after the adoption has been finalized (in contrast to traditional or closed adoptions in which no information is shared and adoption information is confidential).
The above terms and definitions are part of the Taxonomy of Human Services, used here by permission of INFO LINE of Los Angeles.