The main difference between foster care and adoption is who holds the legal responsibility for that child. Another key difference is the type of support that is offered. In foster care, foster parents are supported financially where all expenses are covered.
In contrast, adoptive parents could receive a subsidy but for the most part they are responsible for all decisions and costs related to the adopted child, they will also receive a minimum of 6 months of support from an adoption worker. Foster care is the welcoming of a child into your home to take care of their day to day needs in all areas of life emotionally, physically, socially, mentally.
There are many reasons a child can be placed in foster care, including, for their protection, voluntarily by their parents or caregivers or by court order. To put it simply, anyone can be a foster parent if they decide to make room in their life for a child. There is not a particular type of person who can be a foster parent i.
First, you need to be over the age of 21 and pass a criminal record check and vulnerable sector screening. You will need to be duly screened, trained and licensed by a foster care agency. Foster parents will need to have a bed available in their home for a child. It is preferred that you have a bedroom available that is not shared with another child, however, under certain circumstances, shared bedrooms can be considered.
As a foster parent , you also need to have availability in your schedule for fostering. This does not mean that one adult needs to be home at all times, but some flexibility is required to attend meetings, training and be available for unpredictable events e. Foster agencies will also require parents to be financially secure to cover your own expenses without the compensation you will receive for caring for a foster child in your home.
Fostering begins when you welcome a child into your home. This could be for only a few days, several months or even years. The Nairn Family Homes Family Supervisor also plays a key role in supporting the child and foster family. Care for the child is entirely the responsibility of the adoptive parent or parents.
Once a child has entered the foster care system, the biological parent does not get to select where, or with whom, the child will go. With adoption, on the other hand, placement typically involves the biological parent in some way. The length of stay is also a significant difference between foster care and adoption. While there is no set time-limit, and foster care can sometimes lead to adoption, foster care is a temporary placement.
This can be weeks, years, or an even more long-term placement. Children stay in foster care until they can be placed back with their biological family or into a permanent adopted home. The geographic range of foster care is very narrow, down to the county in which the foster parents live.
This keeps travel costs low and facilitates visits with the biological parents. Adoption, however, is much broader in the spectrum. An adoptive child could be born on the same street as his or her adoptive parents, or on the other side of the world. Both adoption and foster care require certain personal actions and qualities in order for a hopeful adoptive parent to be able to pursue in either. Both systems will ask for a background check and a home study, at the very least.
Adoption agencies will want to verify that a hopeful adoptive parent is fit to raise a child, such as by not having a criminal history of abuse or violent crime, and maintaining a safe home environment. If adoptive parents are interested in international adoption, requirements vary from country to country. For example, some countries require adoptive parents to be at least a certain age or to have a college degree. Some are specific that the fact that parents must be heterosexual or married.
An adoption agent can help determine what is necessary in order to adopt from individual countries. Because a foster child is technically still a ward of the state throughout a foster placement, and therefore not legally the child of the foster parents, potential foster parents have to take classes that prove the couple has the skills to take care of a child.
These classes span a wide range of topics, from car seat safety to racial disparity, to CPR. Usually, at least a few specific classes are required, with the remaining hours flexible. Foster care licensing expires periodically, and renewal is contingent upon continuing education. For instance, my parents have to take at least 12 hours of foster care classes every year in order to renew licenses.
By contrast, adoption does not ask parents to keep proving ability after the adoption placement is finalized. The time from becoming certified to adopt or foster and actually having a child in the home can vary pretty widely between adoption and foster care.
Foster placement timing can be somewhat unpredictable. However, as a general principle, a newly certified foster parent could theoretically get placement immediately. Adoption tends to take a little bit longer.
Once the potential adoptive parents have completed all the requirements necessary to adopt, the next step is to find a child who is a good fit for the family. This, too, can be fairly impossible to predict, because the right match is so subjective. Adoption and foster care follow different planned durations of time—namely, that adoption is a permanent addition to a family, and fostering is usually temporary.
The state of Minnesota has planned for the foster reunification process to take an average of about a year, in order to be certain that a biological parent is ready to be present. Since reunification is considered the best outcome, all efforts will be taken to make that happen before terminating parental rights. A major difference between adoption and foster care is cost. International adoption, in particular, is usually tough on the wallet.
Foster care is funded by the government and comes at a little-to-no net cost to the foster parent. Although foster parents do need to purchase things for the children out of pocket, the state will reimburse the couple for many, if not all, of these expenses. There are many ways to pay for an adoption.
Pairing children with families work quite differently in adoption versus foster care.
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