Monday, November 30, 2009

The importance of adopting older teens

If you haven't seen Blind Side, please go see it!! It is a great movie based on real life events surrounding a homeless teen and the family in Memphis who adopted him. One line in the movie is something like, "He'll be 18 soon, so there isn't much point in looking into adoption." Obviously, the family does go down the road of adoption, and it makes a huge impact not only on the life of the young man, but also on the life of each of the family members. (Only down side to the movie is that it was filmed in Atlanta, not Memphis : ( I was really looking forward to seeing some Memphis landmarks in the movie, but alas, no.)

Here is another story about older teen adoption (from the Youth Villages internal website):

Mary's story: the importance of adoption
Watch Mary Lee, who works in our Business Development Department, tell her life story and how important it was for her to be adopted at age 17.
Mary spent part of her life in foster care. Her greatest wish was to be adopted before turning 18. She always wanted a family who would love and support her, and who would be there for her for life.
She wanted what most people take for granted – a family to visit for the holidays, a mom to call for advice, siblings to bond with, parents who would cheer her on as she graduated from college, a dad to walk her down the aisle on her wedding day and parents who will be grandparents to the children she hopes to have one day.
Just days before her 18th birthday, her wish came true. Mary was adopted by her former case worker and his wife. And she even got a younger sister.
Mary began working at Youth Villages while she was attending law school. She stayed on working in human resources after graduating and today, as a business development specialist, is dedicated to marketing our Transitional Living program and expanding it to new areas of the country.
She has an extensive background in lobbying for permanency rights for children in foster care. After she spoke on Capitol Hill in 2005, Congress passed a bill that allows former foster children to apply for student aid as independent adults, without claiming their adoptive parents' income. This means that older foster children don't have to choose between financial aid for college and a forever family. The legislation was nicknamed the "Mary Lee" bill.

4 comments:

Domestic Kate said...

I was reading somewhere that TN has a 6 month foster parent rule. Is it true that if you would like to adopt an older child, you have to foster first? If you already have children in the home, this seems crazy. Just curious. I know there's a lot of myth about adopting out there, so I figured I'd ask someone who knows!

Megan said...

Good question! Yes, in order to adopt a child, he/she must be in your home for 6 months in pre-adoptive placement (technically foster care). The purpose of this is to make sure that the adoption is a good match for the child and the family - you have a 6-month "trial period". Within that 6 month period, adoption staff is working on the paperwork so that as soon as you reach 6 months, you can finalize the adoption. I worked last year to get a family certified by January 23rd, because the child they wanted to adopt turned 18 on June 24th! The adoption was finalized literally one day before the young lady turned 18!

Megan said...

Oops, meant July 24th - can't get my dates correct.

Domestic Kate said...

That makes more sense - some of the message boards I had read just said you had to foster for 6 months - no mention of it being that specific child! :) Thanks!