Blisstree » transracial

NPR’s Adoption Series

Marcie — Wed, 02 Jul 2008 12:53:58 +0000

Over the past few years NPR has offered up a fabulous series on adoption, not only stories and journals about adoptions covering domestic but also transracial, international, birth mother, and adoptee.

Their latest story is that of an orphan in the 1950’s.

In 1994 they presented The Many Faces of Adoption with four families out of the 1.6 million American families with adoptive children.

Post from: Blisstree

NPR’s Adoption Series

Transracial Adoption at its Best

Marcie — Sat, 14 Jun 2008 21:02:58 +0000

Ah yes, hot topic still…and probably always will be. In the United States 140,000 children are adopted through agencies and 20,000 are adopted by parents of a different race. However, black children are less likely to be adopted into a family of another race and the laws are not helping.

When the Donaldson Adoption Institutes’s report on transracial adoption came out recently it state that non-black families should not be given first choice to adopt…that same race families should.

But, my opinion was that it left children in foster care because to find a same race family to adopt may not always work out. Should children really be prevented from being placed in a forever home because of their race or their potential parent’s race?

Instead, why not educate transracial parents on culture, send children to schools that are more mixed, or ask that children attend summer camps with children of the same race?

Sure, it is not ideal but it still provides children with part of their culture. Instead of growing up in the white suburbs with all white people they would at least have some background.

One such adoptive mother who has done a good job is Theresa Alden, a mother of two black children, Gavin and Graem. She has set up a support group for families who have adopted children of a different race as well changed her lifestyle.

When Theresa Alden adopted two black boys from an agency in Philadelphia, she changed her lifestyle for them and they changed her outlook on race.Alden, who is 50 and white, started attending a black church near her home in Lancaster, established a network of black friends and acquaintances, began listening to more black music and buying children’s books by black authors.

“My boys will be in a minority here. How do you face the issues that go along with that?” she said when asked about her attempts to give them role models and points of reference.

Post from: Blisstree

Transracial Adoption at its Best

The Best of the Best: Top 50 Adoption Blogs

Marcie — Tue, 04 Mar 2008 02:17:14 +0000

From domestic to international adoptions, from first moms to adoptees, from same sex parents to transracial families…the best of the best adoption blogs out there on the internet.

General

Anti-Racist Parent

A Birth Project

Adoptive Parents

Domestic

Production, not reproduction

Plain Jane Mom Letters to a Birthmother