Do
the agency web site & advertisements make it clear that the
agency only does fully open, fully identified adoptions?
|
|
|
|
|
Is
this agency easy to drive to from your home?
|
|
|
|
|
Do
you have a friend who knows or has used this agency and gives it
a very high recommendation?
|
|
|
|
|
Are
there other agencies in your local yellow pages who have much
larger yellow page ads under the adoption heading?
|
|
|
|
|
Is
the agency a church affiliated agency or is it over 30 years
old?
|
|
|
|
|
Does
the agency encourage maternity clients to parent and also offer
free support and guidance in how to parent a child?
|
|
|
|
|
Did
agency staff make it clear that they prefer to do fully open
adoptions and rarely, if at all, will they serve an adopting
family wanting less than a fully open adoption?
|
|
|
|
|
Did
agency staff accurately define open adoption as involving no
secrets between birth and adopting families and ongoing, direct,
in person contact between them?
|
|
|
|
|
Does
the agency strongly recommend, or even require, several
counseling sessions by their staff before a maternity client
starts considering the selection of a family for their child?
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Does
agency require a minimum of 10 hours of training &
counseling for all adopting parents before they are approved for
placement?
|
Does
the agency encourage matching between birth and adopting
families who live close enough to each other for easy visits?
|
|
|
|
|
Does
the agency have fully identified resumes by families adopting,
with full names and addresses as well as local phone numbers on
them, freely available for the selection process?
|
|
|
|
|
Does
the agency always allow maternity clients selecting a family for
their child to be able to study every waiting family available
in the agency for their child and almost never limit maternity
clients to selecting from a few waiting families chosen by
agency staff?
|
|
|
|
|
Does
the agency provide a copy of their fee agreement for adopting
parents with a clearly stated refund policy along with a
clarification that donations cannot be accepted during the
adoption process?
|
|
|
|
|
Does
the original adopting parent fee include money for all maternity
client expenses anticipated with only the agency paying all such
expenses, even if they go above that set amount?
|
|
|
|
|
Is
agency a member of the Child Welfare League of America?
|
|
|
|
|
Is
the race of the child expected one of the last questions asked?
|
|
|
|
|
Total
Number of "Yes" answers, summary:
Email
bbetzen@openadoption.org
with any questions or comments.
|
|
|
|
|
