Parent Profile (Glossary)

Parent Profile: A parent profile is the term often used by adoption agencies and online matching sites. The parent profile is one way potential adoptive parents can tell more about themselves, allowing expectant parents or pregnant women to review information about them before making the decision to match with a couple.

Profiles vary in length from a few pages to an entire book. They often contain pages of information about the couple, their marriage, their family, their homes, their careers, their dreams for their future child as well as their desires for openness and future contact.

Parent profiles are generally the first things that expectant parents view when finding a family for their child.

Most commonly, a parent profile will include a narrative description of the adoptive parent or adoptive family, statistical information, such as age, educational and employment background, and talents and hobbies, plus a "Dear Birth Mother Letter," addressed to the potential birth mother and containing information about the adoptive parent's reasons for adoption, their parenting philosophy, details about their marriage and perhaps even a discussion of their religious and spiritual philosophy on life. The parent profile may even be presented in the form of a Photo Profile or even a notebook or scrapbook.