1. Foster Care and Adoption

2. Foster Care
Temporary legal guardian – the state’s role in making most decisions for children
Parents temporarily unable to provide care
Parents retain limited rights
Examples?
2002: 600,000 living outside home

3. Foster Care Who decides where to place children?
Judges
Social workers
Family foster care: system of license families in each state who act as temporary parents for children who cannot live with their families.
Foster family has temporary physical custody
No legal custody

4. Foster Care
Group homes: residence in which several children in foster care live together under the supervision and care of licensed individuals
Kinship care: children placed with their relatives

5. Foster Care Foster care is a TEMPORARY solution
Goal is family reunification
Termination of parental rights occurs when judge finds child cannot return home
If parental rights are terminated, child can be adopted by:
Former foster care
Relatives
others

6. Emancipation Legal adulthood (16,18,21) Age depends on state
No one has legal custody
If under 21, state must provide “independent living services”
Housing
Job training
education

7. Adoption
Legal process by which an adult or adults become the legal parent(s) of another
Few restrictions on who may adopt
Marital status
Religion
Race
Sexual orientation
Age
However, agencies and courts aim for traditional family structures

8. Adoption Public agencies Private agencies
“go-betweens” – people who arrange adoptions between pregnant woman and family
In some states, this is illegal (black market adoption)

9. Adoption Lengthy legal process Must be approved by the courts
Attorney required for to ensure steps are legally appropriate
Need written consent from birth parents
In some states, judge can determine if adoption is in best interest of child
Waiting period before adoption is legalized.
Adoptive parents: physical custody
Agency/birth parents: legal custody

10. Surrogate
Surrogate mother: woman, other than wife, who agrees to be artificially inseminated with the husband’s sperm.
Contract usually signed before birth
Surrogate consents to child’s adoption by couple
Releases all parental rights
Some states require advance judicial approval of contract
Adoptive Children
Discussion Question:
Should adopted children have a right to know who their birth parents are?

11. Generation Meds