Through our Adoption program, we create and enhance families by bringing foster children together with people who are ready to open their hearts and homes to young people in need.
Filling the Gap
Today in the U.S., there are more than 500,000 children in foster care. About 100,000 of these children are waiting for an adoptive family. In Virginia alone, over 1,000 foster children wait to be adopted. In an effort to improve permanency for Virginia’s waiting children, DePaul’s Adoption program was established. Since 2000, our program has helped to prepare children and their adoptive families by providing the services and support necessary to create forever families.
DePaul offers adoption services at no cost thanks to grant funding that is focused on placing children into adoptive homes and providing support to adoptive families. These grants allow us to provide services through each step of the adoption process—from pre-adoption work to prepare children and families, to recruitment efforts to find appropriate families for waiting children, to post-adoption support to ensure families formed by adoption continue to be successful.
The Children We Serve
The young people served by our Adoption program are usually of 10 years of age or older, may face physical, mental, or emotional challenges, may be members of sibling groups of two or more, and are diverse in race and ethnicity.