Does it make a difference?

So why did you say, "With Foster to adopt there is a much higher rate of disruption"? And if Oregon's placements are all legal risk, then they are all foster/adopt. (The definition of legal risk is "Placement of a child in a prospective adoptive family when a child is not yet legally free for adoption. Before a child can be legally adopted by another family, parental rights of his or her birth parents must be terminated. In a "legal risk" adoptive placement either this termination of parental rights has not yet occurred, or it is being contested. In some cases, termination of parental rights is delayed until a specific adoptive family has been identified" and note that foster/adopt is " also called legal-risk adoption" see [URL=http://naic.acf.hhs.gov/pubs/r_gloss.cfm#l]http://naic.acf.hhs.gov/pubs/r_gloss.cfm#l]niac[/URL] . Which creates a circular argument. You say Oregon only does legal risk placements (aka. foster/adopt) with a 3% disruption rate.....but that foster/adopt (aka. legal risk) has a higer disruption rate. More you haven't explained why one would be better than the other (or better than itself since its the same thing) when 1) it reduces the number of placements the child must endure and 2) foster/adopt parents are specifically warned through out training....and retraining...that legal risk placements are just that---legal risks.

There are too many variables to give Missy a straight answer. Social Services often gets unexpected children: if the police see drugs in the house, they seize every child. Then you get cases where the bis do nothing for reunification, and when they are on their last extension, they suddenly do everything they should have done years ago. People get all set to adopt, and suddenly it all falls apart. Some bios sign papers, then change their minds and say they were pressured. Some foster parents will not even consider adoption until TPR, but this could keep them from getting a child that is just right for them. My advice is to commit it to the Lord and wait patiently for Him. We made clear that we wanted a little girl, 6 to 8 years old. We also made clear that we would not accept a child who had been sent away from another foster home or who was on behavior medication. So they send us an eight year old boy who got kicked out of his foster home, who was on Strattera. Surprise! He's the joy of our lives.

I don't know if the symantics will make a difference. It is clear every state has differences. I have spoken to the intake director at our DHS office to make sure I say the correct info here: In Oregon this is how it is: Foster homes --the normal way we think of them. Foster to Adopt--homes willing to have a placement under any plan currently set with the openess to adopt should the situation arrise. Adoptive Homes: Accepting placements were Adoption is the only plan 80% are legal risk at placement. The other 20% from children who have waited so long they are now legally free. Apparently these issues are different in each state and something perhaps I should take into account. We still have a very low rate of disruptions for adoptive placements. It appears the real differences here are all about the plan for the child. Most children in our state are placed into adoptive homes if their plan is changed to adoption. The Foster to adopt system requires these families to petition the courts and become 'current caretakers' in order to be considered 'only' for an adoption even if the child has been in the home for some time..... otherwise when a plan changes to adoption it is determined by committee where the child will be placed. If the foster family has not been made 'current caretaker' by the court then they have the same chance as any of the other two families being considered at committee....there are only very rare times when three families are not considered at committee. Sadly this only happens when time passes and there are not three families wanting a child In the future I will simply speak for my own state it seems other states have far too many issues for me to address or educate myself about and I will talk with Oregon Families who want to know how our system really works. We use different names for almost every step of the process and we have a completely different way here.....in Oregon it is rare for a child to ever be left in Foster Care for over 16months--if birthfamilies don't get it together in that time TPR is sought and adoptions happen.... We have few children left in Foster Care year after year--while It does happen it is not very often. My children were in foster care for less the 9 months before the plan was made for adoption. They were placed with us less then a year after going into a Foster to Adopt home....and because the foster family was not given 'current caretaker' status they had to move. None of this information I knew before the committee and I had no control over the fact that I didn't know the Foster to Adopt home wanted the kids.. Transistion was horrible for the Foster Mother and I personally left the Foster Home feeling like I had ripped a baby out of his mothers arms.... I did not decide these things, and had no control over the decisions that were made. I have the DEEPEST pain for this woman and can only imagine the pain she feels.... We did not get the information we would have liked to have had to help our children in the transition in fact the Foster Family was unable to even talk with us more then twice. If other states have a more clear system for the Foster to Adopt Families then I am very happy about that. I just know how it feels to take a baby away from a Foster mother who thought from the moment he was put into her arms when he was six-weeks old that she would be able to adopt him. I don't know the reasons they were not given 'current caretaker' status by the judge but I do know this family went through a lot and in the end I was the bad guy who took the baby......as she cried on the staris and fell down to the ground as my car left her driveway. So, in order to not confuse the rest of the country I will just keep things here where it is green and do my talking in Oregon..

Anna, I know you have no control over the situation, but I have to say, the system there stinks!!!!!! Your children were traumatized, as was their family of 9 months!!!!! I hope, as you're advocating for the waiting children, that you advocate for change in the system that tears children from their families (foster families). As a foster mom of 6 years, I have "lost" many children. Most of them have returned to bio familes. If any of them were being moved to go to an adoptive family and I wanted to adopt them, I'd be raising Cain. It's unfair to the children and their familes.

Apparently the program here is different then other states, which has been part of my big effort to encourage people to use the straight adoption program rather then foster to adopt----but if the fact is that most other states have a different program and Foster adopt homes are not dealing with these kinds of issues then I agree my position has been to harsh and stern. I do agree our children were put through trauma they didn't have to go through when you look back at the situation. I agree if the family they were with wanted them it is sad they had to move (I am biased as I love them and want them with me) but, a move didn't have to happen. I would be interested in knowing the process other states have for Foster Families who wish to adopt...... because as far as I can tell this is the hardest was to adopt in Oregon and the most time and effort. I should have found out more about other states instead of believing all states used the same methods. I do feel there should be a more streamlined way to handle this and it is sad the Foster Families have to work so hard to achieve adoption in Oregon.

Where I live foster families are given the first oppurtunity to adopt, as long as a relative is not found.

I wanted to address the original post on this thread. It would seem to me that a foster family would get a quicker placement than a fost/adopt because there are more children taken out of their homes temporarly than for long term. Most kids in our state have to go through many years of in and out of the system before reunification is terminated. Our daughters were placed in 30 day placements twice in the years before they were finally placed in long term foster care. My son was in 3 foster placements before he came as a legal risk placement to our house and all this was before he was 2 years old. The reason we were able to get our baby at 11 months was because he had 3 older siblings who had been in and out of the system for most of their lives with various neglect and one sibling born positox for drugs with long term effects. Now for the rest of the thread. It sounds to me HappyMomAnna, that you were traumasized by the way your adoptive placement happened. It sounds worse than most, but I have been through this 3 times myself. It is heartbreaking for a 2 1/2 year old crying brokenheartedly for his "Mama" when you were the one who took him away. That is the system and you have to be strong for your children. The kids you were placed with were probably not on the National Photolisting of Waiting Children. Most kids without significant challenges, 5 and under, are placed before they need to be on a waiting child photolist. Not all, but most waiting children are older than 5 or 6. If you look at the photolistings, there are a whole lot of 10, 11 and 12 year olds. Whether these children find homes is less about if families are straight adopt or fost/adopt and more about families who want older children and can handle the emotional baggage that they have from the beginnings of their lives. The people who do fost adopt in hopes of adopting a younger child do need to know that they will likely have several go home, but these same families are not interested in older children. They are reacting to the system. Most younger kids are not waiting. These people are not candidates for waiting children until they change their parameters to include older children. If you are wanting to advocate for waiting children, maybe it would be good to work with potential adopters toward looking at older kids. Also older child adoption is sometimes threatening for new parents. Being a foster placement first may give them the courage and experience to be successful with an older child. Your heart is definitely in the right pplace and I wish you all the best. :)

Hearing everything from the other parts of the country I do believe each family considering the Foster to Adopt program should ask the specific questions they may have with the depament they will be fostering with...... It is clear there are differences and there cannot be one answer under al situations. My children may not have been on a National Waiting List however they were on the Northwest Adoption Exchange listed as Waiting Children..... with the plan to be added to the national list if the TRP was completed before placement. The NorthWest Adoption Exchange provides photolistings of children in Alaska, Washington, Oregon and Idaho if anyone is interested the website can be found at this link: [url]http://www.nwae.org/[/url]

Dianna, You hit the nail on the head!! That is exactly what I was asking in my original thread. Thank you for taking the time to answer or to address my concern.

I have asked 4 social workers about dual licensing in the state of Texas.. They no longer offer it since so many children over the age of 5 are waiting for a forever home. if we wanted to do foster care that if the child went up for tpr that we would be considered for adoption if a birthfamily wasnt found to take the child/ren. with foster care alont we have to agree to atleast give a max age of 5.. so in other words we couldnt say 0-3 years old.. we have to take 5 and under..if we want to go the foster/adopt route we cannot take a child younger than 5.. unless it comes with a sibling group.. they are trying to get "the waiting children" into forver homes and by doing dual licensing the older children are being forgotten.. so we chose to do foster care and if a child went up for tpr then we would take adopt classes to get qualified.. But this is all if our kinship placement fdoesnt work out my best friends neices are in the system and im trying to get them into my home once im licensed for it. if they get reunified with there mom then we will take other children into our home.. so i know dual licensing in texas atleast in the DFW area is no longer done.. you have to do one or the other.. if you do fostr/adopt its 5 and older just foster 5 and younger.. from what i understand i guess texas changed not too long ago or its always been like this.. that they dont do dual licenses anymore because older children were getting left behind..

AmyTx I was reading what you posted about the Texas laws, and I am from Texas as well and we are in the process of getting our license for foster care alone and our agency has said nothing to us about the age being 5 and under. Infact our age preferance is 0-6mos. and nobody has said anything to us about changing it. I was just curious about that. We have 4 bio children and right now with the ages my kids are I don't think older children are what we are being called to foster. Infants, I think will fit best in our family right now. But we are doing this as a ministry to those babies, to provide a temp. home until a more permanant home is found.

I am in Texas. I am a little suprised that they haven't informed you of the age ranges you have to choose from. All through PRIDE it was drilled into us that if you wanted babies (which we did/do) you have to consider ages 0-5. In fact, they REALLY made it sound like there were no babies out there. Even when we got our license, our PRIDE trainer told us-- remember that you have to consider placements that are 0-5. I suppose we are lucky because we have a great relationship with our placement worker. I told her that we really wanted newborns. Within hours of being licensed, we had a 5 day old little boy placed with us. While we had him, we got calls for twin 10 day old boys, a 20 day old little girl, a 3 day old boy and his 11 month old brother and a 1 day old girl and her 12 month old brother. We didn't take any of these because my husband and I both work full time and, not having any bio children, we were just getting "broken in" with our one fs and weren't sure if we were ready to have more than one. Well, the day he went home at 3 months old, we had a 6 day old girl and an 11 month old boy placed with us. So, our placement worker has been really good about only calling us for the age we really want, even though we are licensed for 0-5. Talk to your placement worker once you are assigned one. Then, my advice to you is to stick to your guns. If you don't think an older child will work in your family situation, don't accept the placment. It will be better for the child to be placed somewhere else than to possible have to move after it has been placed in your home and it didn't work. I don't know which part of TX you are in, but if you are anywhere near DFW metroplex, there are LOTS of babies/newborns out there. I am about an hour east of Dallas and have had enough calls for newborns to fill both our houses!

Amy, I was licensed in the last class in TX that did dual licensing. I am also an attorney who has worked in the CPS system. Texas was not a dual license state for many years, then the law changed in hopes of allowing adoptions of children in foster care that came open for adoption to happen quicker. Then this year, the law changed back. As I understand it, a major reason TX did away with dual licensing is that many foster parents were hiring their own attorneys and intervening in law suits in cases when CPS was returning the children and the fp's didn't think they should be. If the children had been in the home of the fp's for at least 6 months and the foster home was also licensed as an adoptive home, the fp's claimed standing to enter the lawsuit. As you can imagine, this made things more complicated and more costly for CPS. In order to eliminate the lawsuits, CPS decided to due away with dual licensing so that foster homes would not also be licensed as adoptive homes, therefore it would eliminate the fp's standing to intervene in the lawsuit. However, in theory, this isn't suppose to change a fp's chances of adopting a child in their care. If you are licensed as a foster home and a child in your care comes open for adoption, you are suppose to still get the first chance at adopting them. The child can remain in your care while you go through the rest of the process to become licensed to adopt that child. I haven't seen enough yet to see if this is really what is happening in practice....

Jessica_a Thank you for your info. I live in the southwest part of the Houston area. I have kinda experienced the same thing with one of the social workers at our agency, she makes it sound like there are not very many infants but my good friend that has been fostering with this agency for 15 years said if she choose to, she would never be without a baby. When one baby is placed it is almost immediatly that they get another call. So, I don't know if they tell you that so that you will just consider older kids if a placement of such were to come available. I am not sure. I have another question for you, how long did it take you to get your license? I am just curious, we actually start our PRIDE classses on the 11th of Nov. and they go for four weeks. Our intial paper work has all been done, like application, criminal background checks, referencees, so I am right now trying to get all the things required for the homestudy together, and I just about have that done. The agency said they are pushing to have us licensed before Christmas. So we will see. What was your homestudy experience like?

Hi I wanted to just jump in and let everyone know what my experience has been for the fost/adopt program in CA. I am going through this right now. What we have been told is the major difference is that in a foster home, children are generally placed right away into those homes without a matching period, this is a period of time where in fost/adoptive homes they place the children based on what fits best to your family. They take a period of time and look at your family and the children and make a match. We were told we should have our adoptive placement by Jan. We began our pride training on Oct 2,2003 and end Nov 20,2003 I think this is a very short period of time.People forget that the more picky they are the longer they will what. My husband and I are taking a sibling set who is drug exposed, the more open you are the faster your placement will be. If you are not welling to accept any medical fragile and one pacific sex than you will wait longer....Just be prepared for that what.I am very impressed on how well things have gone, I just pray they continue on this path.Good luck to everyone else and keep me posted how things go.