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GUIDELINES FOR CANADA'S WAITING CHILDREN PROGRAM |
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Adoption
Council of Canada Mission |
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- to
encourage openness and respect as the foundational concepts
for all touched by adoption
- to
promote placement of waiting children
- to
stress the importance of post-adoption support for birth
and adoptive families across their life-span
- to
facilitate communication among groups and individuals working
for the well being of the adoption constellation
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In
addition the Adoption Council of Canada (ACC) |
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- believes
that adoption is a process to meet the needs of children
- believes
that every child has a right to a permanent, nurturing family
- promotes
ethical approaches by all parties involved in recruiting
families and making children's needs real to those interested
- is
committed to promoting ethical adoption practice for all
adoptions, domestic and international
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The
Need for the Canada's Waiting Children Program |
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Although
there are many families waiting to adopt healthy infants, there
have never been enough prospective adoptive families waiting
to adopt all the children in foster care who need permanent
adoptive families. One of the reasons for this is the lack of
knowledge by the general public, and prospective adoptive parents
about the numbers and kinds of children waiting for families.
Traditional recruitment methods have not been successful in
bridging the gap. Therefore the ACC believes that active and
creative efforts are required to recruit adoptive families to
meet each child's needs |
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Why Use the Internet? |
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Experience
with adoption recruitment programs over the last forty years
in Canada and the United States has shown that of the varied
approaches to adoption recruitment; i.e. general
recruitment, public
education, and child-specific recruitment, that child specific recruitment is
the most effective. This approach serves to highlight actual
children that personally engage interested families. Using the
Internet for this purpose adds another communication medium
to those which have been used in the past. |
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Who
Are Canada's Waiting Children? |
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The children waiting for adoption in Canada range in age from
less than a year to teenagers, although most children referred
to the Canada’s Waiting Children program are 3 years and up (to
the age of majority). The children referred to the program tend
to be more challenging than most of the Canadian children in
need of permanent families. This is because children are only
referred to us when no other resources can be found in their
home region. Many of these children have had life experiences
which have hampered their physical, emotional, and intellectual
growth. Some have unknowns in their future because of unknowns
in their past. Some have brothers or sisters who need to be
placed with them. Many have had their futures clouded because of
prenatal exposure to drugs and alcohol. |
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How
the Canada's Waiting Children program works: |
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CWC
Process Guidelines |
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- The
Adoption Council of Canada is an information and referral
service. It is not an adoption agency.
- Only
pseudonyms will be used in public recruitment efforts. A
child's birth name will never be used.
- No
information that would disclose the child's geographic or
agency location will be used in public recruitment efforts.
- No
information that would disclose the child's foster or birth
families will be used in public recruitment efforts.
- The
Canada's Waiting Children program database used on the
Internet will contain only the information shown on the
screen; pseudonym, reference number, month and year of birth
and brief profile describing the child. The main database
from which this information is drawn does not contain
identifying information and furthermore, it is not
accessible from the Internet.
- The
ACC will refer the family's expression of interest to the
child's adoption worker for follow-up
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Agency
process |
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-
Agencies referring children to the Canada's Waiting Children
program are committed to protecting the confidentiality of
their foster children, while making their needs known
accurately to prospective adopters.
- The
agency provides accurate information to the Canada's Waiting
Children program, but ensures that no confidential information
is used in the description of the child for purposes of
public recruitment.
- The
assigned adoption worker works with the child to ensure the
child is ready for placement, i.e. knows that adoption is
the plan. Wherever possible children over six should give
written permission for the information to be used.
- The
adoption worker and foster parents explain the various forms of publicity
to the child and ensure the child knows that the publicity
is for the purpose of seeking a family for himself and other
waiting children.
- The
adoption worker respects the older child's wishes about information
the child does not want disclosed in publicity. This information
can be provided to prospective adoptive parents by the agency
in subsequent confidential discussions.
- The
agency ensures that there is an adoption worker and co-operative
care giver (foster parent or guardian) available to assist
the child with the services required to prepare the child
for publicity and throughout the pre-placement, placement
and post-placement period
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© Canada's Waiting
Children |
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