Questioning our Assumptions about Foster Care

Most people recognize that there are a lot of problems with the foster care system in our country, but I’m not sure we realized how deep they are. The New York Times published the results of a study of 602 youths in Illinois, Iowa and Wisconsin, and the results are rather sobering.

Only half the youths who had turned 18 and “aged out” of foster care were employed by their mid-20s. Six in 10 men had been convicted of a crime, and three in four women, many of them with children of their own, were receiving some form of public assistance. Only six in 100 had completed even a community college degree.

“We took them away from their parents on the assumption that we as a society would do a better job of raising them,” said Mark Courtney, a social work researcher at the University of Washington who led the study with colleagues from the Partners for Our Children  program at Washington and the Chapin Hall center at the University of Chicago. “We’ve invested a lot money and time in their care, and by many measures they’re still doing very poorly.”

I’m all in favor of parental rights. I don’t think it should be easy for the government to intervene in the relationship between parents and children.

But I think our system for dealing with genuine situations of neglect and abuse needs to recognize the deep and inherent need that children have for permanence.

The story for many foster youths is tragically similar: the system is biased towards reunification, even if drug or alcohol-addicted birth parents are making almost no measurable progress toward becoming stable enough to care for their kids again. The result: these young people are shuffled from foster family to foster family for years, opening up deep wounds and leaving many of them incapable of self-sufficiency.

Eventually, they age out of the foster system and are left to become adults on their own – and you see the outcomes listed above.

Children need and deserve permanent and forever families, ideally with a mom and a dad. I don’t claim to have all the answers, but one of the starting points has to be a limit on the amount of time that the foster care system fights for reunification. At that point, the law should require the state to face reality and begin advocating for permanence through adoption.

I hate to say it, but one of the core problems here is that the “business” of foster care would shrink – and the foster care system has grown into a multi-million dollar business of programs and services. I don’t question that the social workers and program coordinators love kids – but their goal should be to work themselves out of a job by eliminating the need for their help, not expanding it.

The structure of the current system has effectively ensured that we continue to have a large population of orphans in the United States – children who desperately need but do not have permanent parents. We don’t tend to think of these kids as orphans, but after being shuffled through the system for years, that is precisely what they are.

This is a tough problem, and advocating for the reform of our local foster care system is one of the four initiatives that we’re planning as a part of our new adoption and orphan care effort. I look forward to sharing more with you on that soon.

Help Bring the Picker’s Little Girl Home from Ethiopia

I’ve never met Casey or Mary Beth Picker, but last year, they had just adopted a little boy from Ethiopia (using the same agency we did) and had written detailed blog posts about their experiences. Their posts really helped us prepare for our trip. It’s been so fun to develop instant friendships with people in the adoption community.

Almost immediately, this family decided to adopt their third child – a little girl – from Ethiopia and they’re already matched and preparing for their trip.

They’ve created an awesome t-shirt to raise the money to bring this precious little girl home. (If you follow me on Twitter or Facebook, you’ve seen me tweet about it.)

I love this shirt. It’s a great conversation starter! I put it on for the first time at a hotel, walked over to the front desk to check out, and the first person I talked to – the front desk clerk – immediately asked me: “145 million orphans…really? wow.”

And I love the quote from William Wilberforce on the back. (If you don’t know who Wilberforce is, he’s the British MP who fought for years to end slavery in Britain and finally succeeded in 1833. He died three days after the Slavery Abolition Act passed.)

“Having heard all of this, you may choose to look the other way but you can never again say you did not know.”

This family has a heart for orphans and making a difference in the life of a child. Let’s help them bring their little girl home. Buy one of these awesome shirts today!

Thank You, President Obama

Yes, I know…both my liberal and conservative friends clicked on this post with either shock or horror. But we only have one President at a time, and I think it’s important to point out when President Obama is right, even if I think it’s rare.

The part of me that believes that everyone who wants health care coverage should be able to get it is happy; the part of me that believes in fiscal sustainability is very much not. The bill the President signed creates a bloated new government entitlement that violates the first law of fiscal sustainability: when you’re in a hole, stop digging.

But tucked amidst the trillion dollars of new spending was something very exciting for those of us in the orphan care and adoption community: the preservation of the Adoption Tax Credit for another year.

Here are some details from Elizabeth Wiebe over at Christian Alliance for Orphans:

To encourage and support adoption, the adoption tax credit was expanded by President Bush and Congress in 2001.  This increased the value of the credit from $5,000 to $10,000, and indexed it for inflation (meaning the credit would increase each year to keep up with inflation.)  For 2010, its value had risen to $12,170.  However, the 2001 increase was scheduled to “sunset” at the end of 2010.  This would mean that any adoptions finalized after December 31, 2010 would be eligible for—at most—a credit of only $5,000.

This sunset has now been extended one year.  That means that it will need to be extended again before the end of 2011.  For the present, however, this extension comes as very welcome news for families considering adoption or in the adoption process.

Specifically, the provisions contained in the health care bill include:

• The current adoption tax credit has been extended until the end of 2011;
• The value of the adoption tax credit has been increased from $12,170 to $13,170.
• The increase is “retroactive,” meaning that any adoption occurring after January 1, 2010 is eligible for this higher credit.
• The credit is now refundable. This means that even families that owe zero taxes can receive the full tax credit in the form of a tax refund to help with their adoption-related expenses.

You can read the direct language from the bill here (you’re looking for page 903).

Now we need to make the adoption tax credit permanent. It doesn’t erase the significant cost (usually $20,000 or more) of an adoption, but it certainly can make it much more affordable, and play a big role in giving these waiting kids a forever family.

Thank you, Mr. President.

Read more

Bethany’s Forever Family

This photograph has reached “iconic” status in my mind. Just days after the earthquake in Haiti, Ted and Tina Knox (family friends for many years) flew to Miami to meet a plane that brought their little girl Bethany home.

I just got to meet Bethany last Sunday at our church. She was adorable, giggling and shyly waving when I stroked her cheek and declared her “the cutest Knox ever.”

Now the Colfax Record has just run a beautiful front page story about Bethany, and how she is finally home with her forever family.

In the midst of devastating news following the Jan. 12 earthquake in Haiti stories of hope have emerged.

One of those miracles is 6-year-old Bethany, who has found a “forever family” with local residents Ted and Tina Knox.

The first step in the lengthy adoption process began a few years ago when the Knoxs’ 21-year-old daughter, Shanley, volunteered to spend a month working with Three Angels Children’s Relief in Haiti.

“While she was there she began writing about her experience and about the different kids,” said Tina Knox, who grew up in Newcastle.

What really pulled on Tina’s heart, though, was when her daughter wrote about the orphans longing to have a “forever family”…

“She literally came out of Haiti with the clothes on her back and a small ragged blanket,” explained Tina, who admits the arrival of a six-year- old is a big adjustment for their entire family.

“We got the call on Monday morning, took a red-eye flight to Florida on Monday night and landed in Florida on Tuesday morning,” recounted Tina. “When I got to the place where she was staying, I said, ‘I am here now. I am your mama.’ She just put her arms around my neck and wrapped herself around my waist and clung to me. She just hung on and hasn’t really let go.”

Enjoy this great piece of weekend reading!

UPDATE: Bethany’s sister Shanley is on the front page of Biola University’s student newspaper with her story about “Expecting Miracles from Haiti.”

Photo Credit: Elizabeth Huijskens (top), Colfax Record (middle)