National Adoption Month banner, taken from the National Adoption Month website
Today is the start of National Adoption Month, and all month long we will be blogging about adoption with a particular focus on promoting permanency for children and youth in foster care.
To begin, we start today with a link to the National Adoption Month website, a partnership between the Children’s Bureau, AdoptUSKids, and the Child Welfare Information Gateway.
The efforts to promote national and political attention on adoption has been a bi-partisan effort over the years. The first attention to promoting permanency for youth in foster care was by Massachusetts Governor Michael Dukakis in 1976. National Adoption Week was his effort to focus attention on the need for permanency for children and youth in foster care. In 1984, President Ronald Reagan brought National Adoption Week nation-wide. President Bill Clinton broadened the effort from a week to a month in 1995 and in 1998 led efforts to create an internet registry to more effectively match children with prospective adoptive parents.
The National Adoption Month website has resources for professionals, adoptive parents, birth parents, and adopted persons.
Finally, check what events your state will be hosting for National Adoption Month. Many states host National Adoption Day events, which this year falls on November 22, 2014. In Minnesota, some events include Circus of the Heart, an family celebration event for families that have adopted Minnesota waiting children, and some counties will perform adoption finalizations on November 22, 2014. Check here for your state’s events.