National Adoption Awareness Month
Every year, November is recognized as National Adoption Awareness Month. While all adoption related issues are important, the particular focus of this article is the adoption of children currently in foster care. These are children who desperately need families of their own. Each child is available for adoption and many have special needs. All of them deserve the chance to grow up in a safe, loving and permanent home. Because the public is often unaware of these children and their needs, we would like to focus special attention to our "waiting children" during National Adoption Awareness Month with the hope that we can unite many of them with permanent, adoptive parents.
This article spotlights a local family who became a forever family to a child. Kyle and Jackie Peterson have been licensed foster parents for eight years. Throughout this time, they’ve had the opportunity to provide a temporary home for many children. Carson, a young boy needing a foster family was placed into their home. In the mean time, the agency worked with Carson’s birth family in an attempt to resolve the issues that caused him to be removed from their home. However, they could not be resolved, so the agency was awarded permanent custody of Carson. On August 12, 2009, Carson became Carson Peterson - Kyle and Jackie’s son.
Pictured: Kyle, Jackie and Carson Peterson, along with other family members at Probate Court with the Honorable Judge Richard P. Carey at the adoption hearing.
Adopting through foster care is permanent. Once a child is adopted through foster care the birth parents cannot attempt to re-claim them or go to court for their return. Adoptive parents have the same rights and responsibilities as parents whose children were born to them. A family formed through foster care adoption is forever.
Clark County continually needs adoptive families to provide permanent loving homes. Many of these children may have been abused, neglected or abandoned. The children represent all ethnic and age groups, from infancy through teens. Some may have disabilities and require special care. Others may have brothers and sisters who will need to be placed together.
Adopting from foster care is affordable. Most child welfare agencies cover the costs of home studies, court fees, and provide post-adoption subsidies. Thousands of employers offer financial reimbursement and paid leave for employees who adopt and federal/state adoption tax credits are available to most families. Support and other post-adoption resources are also available.
To find children available for adoption at Family and Children Services of Clark County, please call Marci at 937-327-1752 or view a photo listing at:
http://www.clarkdjfs.org/family-children/available-children.html.
