Conclusion

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Catherine E. Rymph
Keyword(s):  
Foster Care ◽  
Child Welfare ◽  
Low Income ◽  
Parental Rights ◽  
Birth Mothers ◽  
Termination Of Parental Rights ◽  
Foster Mothers

The conclusion briefly summarizes some of the developments in foster care in the 1970s, 1980s, and 1990s, including the rise of the permanency movement, the passage of the 1980 Adoption Assistance and Child Welfare Act, and the 1997 Adoption and Safe Families Act, each of which shaped the development of foster care, particularly in the areas of subsidized adoption and easier paths to Termination of Parental Rights (TPR). The conclusion also argues that society’s reluctance to adequately support low income birth mothers and low paid foster mothers is part of a broader ambivalence about careworkers in general.

Adoption

2021 ◽  
pp. 205-238
Author(s):  
Sanford N. Katz
Keyword(s):  
Child Welfare ◽  
State Regulation ◽  
Individual Autonomy ◽  
Parental Rights ◽  
Parent Child Relationship ◽  
Termination Of Parental Rights ◽  
Adoptive Family ◽  
The Past ◽  
Child Relationship ◽  
Private And Public

This chapter addresses the establishment of a new parent–child relationship through adoption. It explores the recurring tension between individual autonomy and state regulation in the placement of children for adoption, and how it is reflected in the major developments in adoption in the past half-century. During the twentieth century, adoption was a specialized child welfare service performed by social workers in private and public child welfare agencies. Whether a birth mother relinquished her infant for adoption voluntarily or whether adoption was the final outcome of a child dependency proceeding, the articulated goal, sometimes achieved and sometimes mere rhetoric, was to advance the best interests of the child. These two tracks—voluntary relinquishment and involuntary termination of parental rights—resulting in adoption have given rise to dual systems in the past forty years. Even though the ultimate outcome of adoption for children from either system may be the same in terms of a court establishing the adoptive status, there is a major difference in goals. The goal of the voluntary system may well be to provide a childless couple with an infant so as to continue the adoptive family name. The aim of dependency proceedings resulting in the termination of parental rights is to protect children, and the disposition of adoption is a vehicle for providing a child with a permanent attachment to a family.

scholarly journals The Cumulative Prevalence of Termination of Parental Rights for U.S. Children, 2000–2016

2019 ◽  
Vol 25 (1) ◽  
pp. 32-42 ◽  
Author(s):  
Christopher Wildeman ◽  
Frank R. Edwards ◽  
Sara Wakefield
Keyword(s):  
African American ◽  
Native American ◽  
Foster Care ◽  
Life Tables ◽  
Parental Rights ◽  
African American Children ◽  
Termination Of Parental Rights ◽  
Synthetic Cohort ◽  
American Children ◽  
Cumulative Prevalence

Recent research has used synthetic cohort life tables to show that having a Child Protective Services investigation, experiencing confirmed maltreatment, and being placed in foster care are more common for American children than would be expected based on daily or annual rates for these events. In this article, we extend this literature by using synthetic cohort life tables and data from the Adoption and Foster Care Analysis and Reporting System to generate the first cumulative prevalence estimates of termination of parental rights. The results provide support for four conclusions. First, according to the 2016 estimate, 1 in 100 U.S. children will experience the termination of parental rights by age 18. Second, the risk of experiencing this event is highest in the first few years of life. Third, risks are highest for Native American and African American children. Nearly 3.0% of Native American children and around 1.5% of African American children will ever experience this event. Finally, there is dramatic variation across states in the risk of experiencing this event and in racial/ethnic inequality in this risk. Taken together, these findings suggest that parental rights termination, which involves the permanent loss of access to children for parents, is far more common than often thought.

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