[aMarylandfamily]

Our homestudy was originally prepared for "adoption"... when it came time to take a placement, an interview was held with our worker and an addendum was added allowing us to foster as well as adopt.

Any child placed with you is considered "foster to adopt" for the first six months (or a year as in the case of Oregon) ... basically meaning that the child's adoption assistance and services are strung through an account for same and once adoption is put in for finalization everything changes over to adoption accounts ... more red tape than anything else.

ICPC approval is obtained (requested by placing agency/state to state taking child) when accepting a placement from a different state than your own and that covers supervision requirements, insurance transfer and any of the particulars ... i.e., legal risk, etc. acknowledgement). If you take one out of state, be careful to request transfer of the medicaid vs. just accepting the placing states as that can be a red tape nightmare as their state's medicaid covers what services are obtained in that state only ... unless you can get a doctor in your state to accept that state's medicaid ... including pre-approvals which can be difficult in the middle of the night. Ok ... now I'm adding more to your confusion - sorry -

Keep sending questions - the more you ask, the more you learn, the more knowledge you have which is ammunition for whatever question comes your way.

[aMarylandfamily]

Having to be part of a presentation of more than one family to committee doesn't slow down your chances ... in fact once you get into one it often speeds it up as then you can state "we were presented to committee" and that keys into the worker that another worker has already done the work to determine you meet the majority of their requirements and thus center on whether or not you are a match for the child.

[kay]

Regarding the foster issue, you'd have to check with your agency/worker, since I think it varies from state to state. In my state (CA), though rights were already terminated, and I went into the process with the intent of adopting, while the kids are in your home and not yet finalized, they're still foster children, so you have to be a licensed foster parent. When I did it (don't know if it's changed since), it was a minimum of 6 months before I could sign the papers agreeing to the adoption, and then months more before the court date came around.

Oh, yeah, the other meaningless tangle I had to get through was getting two sets of fingerprints! The adoption and foster care people apparently don't talk to each other about such things. You'd think there'd be a centralized database, but no . . .

[tntwalker]

Hi we live in Washington we sent a home study in on child in Oregon but we weren't selected for committee. Oregon puts the child on the web site, runs them in their two newspaper, and on TV so they get alot of home studies. Hard state to adopt from but they say that they have less failed adoptions. My work and I thought by reading what was put on her bio we were the perfect match. Guess not!!!!

We have also pursued 2 children in Idaho one the worker made all the desions and the one we were just picked for her, we went to committee on her. She isn't Legally Free we do have our foster care lisence so that helps with visit because most state require it. We might not ever get to adopt her until she's of legal age. Also it take awhile to get the interstate compact finished. We are going there on the 9th to meet face to face I can't wait. We talk on the phone everyother day and write letter. Her foster parents don't have internet.

As for getting licensed for foster care most state have classes and they do a home study if yours isn't current, back ground checks, CPR and HIV classes. But if you are thinking of going for a not legally free you will need your foster care license and it will really help for visits. Even if they are legally free it will help.

Because after we visit her in 8 days , Idaho send her here and visit first with her case worker then by herself and go on vacation with us. I'm hoping to keep her for the rest of the summer. I was told the interstate compact won't be done until almost or after school starts.

I hope this also helped it is just what we are going thru in this long process. We started November of last year with the classes and didn't get license until March. It will be as long as if I had her myself by the time we get her. Except she 15??? LOL


Terri

[bange]

Ok... Do the children's social workers pick strickly from your homestudy... or do you have contact with them? It seems like your HS would have to be pretty unique to stand out among all the others.


Also, how many homestudies usually are chosen for a final selection? And how many usually do they have total?... I know it is different for every child but just an estimate. On average 20? 50?

[ajjhmf]

I think it is really varies for each case. For our son, our cw was his cw's supervisor. We made a point of meeting our cw in person once she was assigned to us and went to an adoption picnic to get to know some of the cw's in the department. I know that picnics and such are meant to get to know kids, which we did, but we also felt it was good to meet the cw's. We thought it would be easier for them to match us if we were more than a case file. (In our county, a one department trains and writes hs and another matches familes. A third works with ongoing (foster) cases.) We also tried, if we could, to phone any cw's we sent our hs to.

I think the final selection depends as well. We went to committee 3 times. We were one of 3 for our son, one of 10 on another and one of 5 on the last. In each case I think that 50-100 hs were received. Obviously we were choosen for our son, and we withdrew right before the committee on the others since we had already been matched with J. Since we were matched within our own county, we were able to request the cw who wrote our hs as well as our cw to attend the staffing since we couldn't be there.

But all of this really depends on the agency you work with. I know things differ from county to county, much less state to state. My advice would be to get to know how your agency works and then branch out from there. Before we innundated our cw with requests to send out our hs, we met with her to get a feel of how she works. Would it be better to call or e-mail? Which states are the best to work with? How often should we follow-up once a hs was sent? That type of thing.

I can remember being where you are now. There are so many unknowns. Your doing great by asking questions here, but don't feel bad about asking your cw once you start looking.

Blessings,
Jenny

[missw005]

[quote=bange]Ok... Do the children's social workers pick strickly from your homestudy... or do you have contact with them? It seems like your HS would have to be pretty unique to stand out among all the others.
\QUOTE]

They do pick from the homestudies. They can get 30. 50. 100, 200 - just depends on the CW. Some will stop after 50 studies, some will set a date that they will stop accepting studies, some never set limits.

Here's how I've been told it works:
There's a 2 y.o. AA child...........

So let's say they have 100 studies. They pick some parameters to weed them down - ie, only families with children, only families with at least 1 AA parent, only families who live in a diverse neighborhood/city, etc.

That gets them down to 50. Then they add more parameters: only families with 2 AA parents, only families with children over 7 (so the new child will be the youngest by a few years), families with no pets (child is allergic), etc.

That gets them down to 15. They add more parameters, on the child's disabilities/health issues (asthma, ADD, etc.)

Then they're down to 5. Now they usually do contact the families, to let them know they're in the top 5, to ask them any questions they may have, to get more info about the family and the city/neighborhood they live in, etc. I've had some states ask for more than that - a photo album of our family, or info/brochures on our area where we live; recommendation letters from friends or people from our city, etc. Then they have a staffing, where they look at the 5 families. In Oregon, we were represented by a worker who "presented" our family to the staffing committee, showed the stuff we brought, said why she thought we'd be the best choice for Q. After all the presentations, the workers discuss and decide who the best placement will be for that child. (We were chosen for Q!!!) Then they call the family to tell them, and shortly afterward they call the other families (or their worker) to let them know they weren't chosen.

Every state does it differently. If you've read my posts, I've been to the final selection committee four times in the last month - and have been #2 or #3 every time. (they usually pick a 2nd choice in case the first family decides they're not interested or something changes their minds) And the rejection is HARD. Especially knowing you were #2. I've really struggled dealing with it - no matter how many times people on this board have reminded me that MY child is still out there waiting for me, and the child I wasn't chosen for obviously wasn't meant for me.
Still sucks though.

Hope that answers your questions. Feel free to PM me anytime!

Sandy

[bange]

Thanks, that is very helpful.

So do the families usually only find out more details about the child AFTER they are selected? Or upon submitting their homestudy?

[claschober]

In CA, we were called by a sw that said they wanted to present two little boys to us. We had already been chosen for them and had no idea our homestudy had been shown at all. When we went to the presentation they gave us a background on the boys and their situation and then gave us a picture of them and told us to think about it and let them know. We called her the next day to tell her we were accepting the placement, had visitation with them for a week, and then they moved in. Once we had accepted placement we learned even more about our boys, but to be honest most of the learning came from meeting their previous foster mom and talking to her. She knew much more than the sw's did.

For our county we have a sw, the children have a sw and then their is an adoption sw....they all met and went through various homestudies and chose us. A few weeks after they chose us is when they called. Our situation is a little different in that our sw quit during all of this and has not been replaced yet, so we only have the adoption sw and the child's sw.

The more involved in the process we get, the more I realize that there is no exact way things will happen. Every situation is unique and different and we just have to be as flexible as possible. We are definetly learning more and more with each day!

Best of luck to you on your journey,

Cindy

[Lorraine123]

In our case, we knew very little about our daughter until we were chosen. We were told her age, and some disorders - RAD, PTSD. We didn't even know her real name until after we were chosen. Then we were given a little more info (very little actually) and we talked with her foster family and her therapist. Her worker received over 100 homestudies for her. She picked her top 3. Therefore if we had said no at any time, she could have moved on to the next.

Like missw, we were chosen second a few times. We were told that there was a possibilty that the chosen family would turn down the placement as they learned more abut the child, but that never happened.

The info given to you is very scant prior to you being chosen due to privacy.

[missw005]

Originally Posted by bange

So do the families usually only find out more details about the child AFTER they are selected? Or upon submitting their homestudy?

bange,
You know, I actually vented about this issue on another board. It seems really hinky to me.
When I first started out - 10 years ago (God, that seems like a lifetime....) - it was different. You would look through a book of waiting children, and there would be a 3-5 paragraph bio with a photo of each child. Sib sets sometimes took up 2 or 3 pages, depending on the size of the set and the ages of the kids (older kids, more info). When you applied for the child and sent in your study, you would get a longer bio - maybe 2-5 pages long (longer for sibs) with more details about the child - why they were removed, school info, medical & behavioral issues, etc.
Then, when the workers wheedled all the studies down to the top 4 or 5 families, you would then get the huge file - anywhere from 20 to 100 pages long. (the longest I ever got was over 300 pages, and the boy was 3!!!!!) Then you got a week or so to read it, then get back to the child's SW whether you were still interested or not. This would weed out more families - get the # down to 2 or 3 - sometimes 1 or 2 - and it would be a LOT easier for the SWs to make a decision, as the families had wheedled themselves down. (if that makes sense)

Nowadays, families know very little about their child before they are selected. J was a completely different story, but Q was typical. I saw him on the web, applied for him, had my SW send in my study, then got a 4 or 5 page report back on him when I was in the top 10 families. I did NOT get more info on him until I was selected - only then I did I get the big shebang.

It seems wrong to me, deceptive almost. And I understand there are privacy issues with the kids - but many SWs and states are NOT honest about the kids' real issues and I think it drags out the process even longer, let alone adoptive parents being "surprised" with issues they were unaware their child(ren) had.

On the other thread I mentioned earlier, one of the poster's points was that SWs are trying to get a broader range of families looking at that child - and that they may consider issues they wouldn't have normally (and realize they really can deal with them) once they see the child's photo and mini-bio.

Still, I think it's deceptive and trickery to say the least. IMHO, the old way was better.

Sorry that rambled on so long.

Sandy

[tntwalker]

I think there are some SW that are very deceptive we have run into them and went out of state and everything we had been told was very minimized I think that she thought if we saw the child and spent time with her that we would take her on anyway. Then you have some that give you so much up front that it's overwhelming. It varies from state to state and SW and SW. Some give you info for just asking, some want home studies, some wait until your selected.

I mail in my own home studies to the SW except in Oregon where they require worker to worker contact only. I tried to make my home study stand out from the rest. I put a cover letter about us and our family what we think we have to offer the child paying close attention to what is said on the site about the child and their need or wants. I also send pictures just printed out four to a page of regular paper about 8-12 pictures of the family, house, animals, and also the schools. Since we were always going for school age kids. I include information about the community and schools also.


Terri
BIO M-20
BIO N-19
soon to be home we hope V-15 we will see her this weekend and talk to her tonight.
Her SW has us send all letters to her and she then pass it on to V. I hope it works out we are so attached already.

[Lorraine123]

I also feel that the process is very shady. In my case, we knew very little until we were chosen. Even then we were given very little information. In fact, we have no social services records, no therapists records and no school records prior to her being placed with us. We were told those were confidential. (we have been round and round with the state of PA about this). It seems that you meet the child and they give you a little more info. Then you start visitng and they give you a little more, etc. By then you are in love with this child and you can't say no, when you would have in the first place. Very suspicious......

[tntwalker]

My question is how does all the child's stuff get to your home do you pick them up or does the sending state send them to you. Terri

[Lorraine123]

What do you mean by child's stuff? Their clothes and toys? Those we picked up from her foster home. My daughter had really great foster parents, so we always picked her up there and dropped her off when we visited. We were also free to call her there, which we did every night.