Taste in Potomac 2022: Thank You For Your Support!

How did you first get involved with Adoptions Together?
I was introduced to Adoptions Together by Margo Devine, a good friend who knew I was interested in learning more about adoption and how I might be able to help.

What made you decide to give your first gift?
During my first meeting with Janice Goldwater, I felt her passion and devotion to adoptive children and families, learned more about the challenges all parties in the adoption process endure, and how Adoptions Together was helping. While I had considered becoming an adoptive parent at that time, I was not ready to take that step. However, I knew I wanted to contribute in some way so I decided to become a financial donor.

Why do you enjoy giving to this organization?
I am confident my gifts are being used to help children and adults come together to form families, and will help families and children overcome challenges that may arise in the years to come.

What inspires you about Adoptions Together?
Adoptions Together’s devotion and dedication to helping older youth in foster care.

What is your favorite program/service/etc to donate to?
I do not donate to any one program or service because I trust that my gifts will be used by Janice and her team efficiently and effectively for their highest priorities at the time.

What do you hope to accomplish through your philanthropy?
Providing much-needed resources to help connect families with children and create long-lasting families. It is really that simple.

What do you wish everyone knew about this cause?
Older youth in foster care are usually not the focus of adoption agencies because it is often “easier” to find parents for newborns or very young children. Janice and her team spend their time, talent, and resources on finding homes for older youth in foster care, which I believe is especially important. Adoptions Together is a unique organization and a treasure for our community.

How did you first get involved with the organization?
During 40 years as a Foreign Service Officer I frequently had assignments that involved assisting U.S. families who were adopting foreign-born children. Similar to a neo-natal nurse, I was an expert about the challenges that can be involved with the process of completing an adoption, but knew much less about the families’ experiences after they brought their children home. I only knew that adoptions, and the urgency of encouraging and supporting adoptive families, was important to me. After I retired, a friend introduced me to Janice Goldwater and to Adoptions Together. I was deeply impressed with the breadth and range of services, including opportunities to celebrate and to share insights, that Adoptions Together offers to adoptive families at all ages and stages of life. The more I have learned, the more I have appreciated the importance of Adoptions Together’s commitment to be a trusted resource for families every step of the way, including after those children grow up and have families of their own.

What made you decide to give your first gift?
Every child deserves to grow up in a family. When a family is struggling, there should be resources to help see them through to a stronger foundation, or to help ensure a safe outcome for the children with a relative or in another loving home. I was honored to be asked to join Adoptions Together’s Board. The commitment, initiative, and energy of the staff and the Board inspired me to want to contribute my own “time, talent, and treasure” to that team effort.

Why do you enjoy giving to this organization?
Almost by definition, in my experience, adoptive families are also adaptive, resilient well-springs of positive energy. As a result, AT events like the annual family picnic, the golf event and Taste in Potomac are tremendous fun. We are friends, parents, a community working together to ensure all the children in our community have the resources, attention and loving support they need and deserve to thrive. I enjoy being part of the AT community and am proud of AT’s years-long record of effective, high-impact programs and careful use of resources.

What is your favorite program/service/etc to donate to?
Of all the great Adoptions Together initiatives, my favorite are the marvelous, innovative family finding programs which search for family members or friends whom children who have grown up in foster care may have lost touch with. All too often, these children leave the system entirely on their own, without having one single person whom they have known all their lives. So many moves, new schools, new placements, abrupt shifts…so Adoptions Together created a solution that has already changed the lives of an incredible amount of children. An expert team – including a former bounty hunter – with the permission of a teenager in foster care, reads each child’s file, identifies people who were at some point close to the child (relatives, teachers, neighbors, foster parents), tracks them down and explores the possibility that they might serve as mentors as the children head out into the world on their own. Almost without exception they have connected these young people with individuals who remember them as children and are willing to be a resource to them. What an incredible concept! I wish we could train teams for every city and community.

What do you hope to accomplish through your philanthropy?
I hope to equip Adoptions Together to reach more families and children who can benefit from their expertise and from connecting with other families. I also hope to enlist others to support Adoptions Together and contribute their energy to increasing the visibility and addressing the needs of vulnerable children.

If you were talking to someone else about giving to our organization, what would you tell them?
I would tell them Adoptions Together is an organization that strengthens every family in our community, not only those with adopted children. In addition to families, Adoptions Together works with social workers, hospital staff, teachers, and others to help them better address challenges that affect us all: living with disabilities, building self-esteem, blended and inter-racial families, life transitions.

What do you wish everyone knew about this cause?
If you are looking for ways to make a difference, here is an organization that is thoughtfully and purposefully working to move children from foster care to permanent loving homes and working to support families who have opened their homes to the most vulnerable children in our community.

As the war in Ukraine intensifies, Adoptions Together is holding the Ukrainian people in our hearts and prayers. We are also thinking of those who live here in the United States and consider Ukraine or Russia as their homeland. As we witness the violence and devastation unfold in the news and in our social media feeds, we are acutely aware of the potential impact that these horrific events may be having on families who have adopted children from this region. The images and stories are deeply traumatic, and the suffering is palpable.

We know that children and adults who were adopted from Ukraine and Russia have a deep connection to their culture of origin. Many may be worrying about birth family who remain in their home countries, and others may be struggling with how to manage the growing anti-Russian sentiment that is being expressed in our country and throughout the world. Even for those of us who don’t have a personal connection to the region, the images of war and suffering can significantly impact our own mental health and the mental health of our loved ones.

For those supporting the ones who are hurting, we know that we can’t change the devastating consequences of the war in Ukraine. What we can do is remain attuned, aware, and available to our children, friends, and spouses as they experience the complexity of emotions being triggered by daily images of violence and terror in their homeland. We can lean into and initiate difficult conversations, answer questions and address concerns in a developmentally appropriate, direct way, validate and explore feelings and fears without judgment and minimization, and utilize our own networks of support so that we can be there for others.

Below are some resources that may be of interest, especially if you are supporting children and teens:

Talking with Children About War

Talking with Children about Ukraine

Adoptions Together will be hosting a Community Town Hall on March 16 as a forum of support for adoptive parents. For more information, click here.

Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton recently issued an opinion classifying medically necessary gender-affirming care to youth as child abuse. AG Paxton’s statement stands in direct opposition to extensive scientific knowledge and the evidence-based care recognized by numerous professional societies, including the American Academy of Pediatrics, American Medical Association, Endocrine Society, and American Academy of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry.

Adoptions Together holds the foundational principle that every child has the human right to healthcare responsive to their whole person, including their identity and their experiences. Age-appropriate medical care based on clear evidence that results in undeniably positive outcomes is not child abuse. We adamantly oppose and renounce any legal or legislative activity that would seek to deny a child’s access to necessary healthcare. Governor Abbot and AG Paxton’s directive has dire consequences for the children and youth it impacts and is an indefensible motion that goes beyond political discussion.

Transgender and nonbinary youth face an incredible amount of disproportionate discrimination, abuse, and violence leaving them in a vulnerable position to suffer higher rates of homelessness, suicide, child welfare involvement, and other negative outcomes with lifelong effects. Healthcare that intentionally meets their needs profoundly reduces these risks to their mental and physical health and social well-being. The AG’s statement effectively supports the invalidation and dehumanization of transgender and nonbinary youth in society that is at the root of these immense challenges, creating an environment even more difficult to grow up within.

As experts in trauma, relational psychology, and applied neuroscience, Adoptions Together recognizes that the best way to prevent negative outcomes is to treat the entire individual with care responsive to their specific needs. Healthcare systems should create spaces of healing and should be accessible to all. Children are the future of society and making life-saving healthcare inaccessible to children who are already vulnerable to disproportionate suffering due to their identity is a rejection of all that we stand for. Adoptions Together stands for legal and legislative actions that affirm our youth, prevent suffering, and support our most vulnerable populations at every stage of their life.

Click on the following for helpful resources:

• Click here to learn more about gender-affirming healthcare.
• Click here to learn more about gender inclusive & responsive healthcare systems.
• Click here to learn more about what it means to be transgender or nonbinary.
• Click here to learn how you can be an ally for transgender and nonbinary youth.

As we celebrated and reflected on Black History Month throughout the month of February, we’re revisiting last year’s blog post, “More Than a Black Square: Actions Matter.” In this post, we shared that a core goal of Adoptions Together is to address systemic racism and white supremacy through the services we deliver. It’s important to note that this is a pivotal focus of our organization year-round, not just in the month of February.

We put truth to these words through our actions. In honor of this year’s Black History Month, we’re reviewing the commitments we made last February and sharing honest feedback, recommitments, and new steps we’re taking in 2022 to address implicit or explicit racism and white supremacy in the child welfare system. Click through the information below to learn more.

Internal Initiatives and Community Building:

Diversity Committee:

• 2021 Response ▽

  Adoptions Together’s Diversity Committee was formed in the fall of 2019 and officially started meeting in 2020. Beginning in June 2020, in addition to planning training opportunities and making policy recommendations, our Diversity Committee instituted monthly Brown Bag Zoom Lunches, creating a safe space for our staff members and contractors to come together to listen, learn, and have respectful, yet unapologetically frank conversations.

• 2022 Update ▽

  Throughout the past year, we were thrilled that the Diversity and Inclusion Committee meetings became an opportunity for connection, growth, and productive discussion for our staff. In an effort to continue to learn based on feedback, the Diversity and Inclusion Committee is revamping and enhancing the meetings for 2022 as well as connecting with the staff on a more regular basis. One example of an initiative is sharing contributions of a specific culture and/or intersection of cultures each month. For February, the Committee shared information about successful, dynamic change makers in the Black community including Bayard Rustin, Brad Simms, and Ayana Elizabeth Johnson.

Stronger Together | Processing and Leading Social Change

• 2021 Response ▽

  An initiative that began in January 2021 and includes weekly full staff dialogs to process personal feelings, create mutual understanding and support, and identify practice changes and new services that will enhance the impact of the agency. The well-being of our team is critical to our ability to provide optimal services and staying flexible and responsive to the needs of the community ensures that we are delivering the highest impact services possible.

• 2022 Update ▽

  Started after the January 6 insurrection, the Stronger Together meetings were an excellent opportunity for empathetic check-ins with staff throughout much of 2021 as together we navigated the many difficult feelings that emerged.

Domestic Infant Placement Program Policy

• 2022 Update ▽

  While race has always been at the forefront of our mission since our inception, over the past 2 years we have deepened our conversations and study regarding race and practice in our programs and as an agency at large. We listened to experiences from staff, people who were adopted interracially, families who adopted interracially, and clients and colleagues of color who bravely shared their own trauma. Additionally, we turned the lens to ourselves and to our practices to find ways that we could do a better job aligning our values with our policies.

  Specifically, in our Domestic Infant Program, we have identified ways that we can prioritize race when measuring the best interests of the children that we place for adoption. The voices of adoptees are consistently encouraging adoption professionals to place children in same-race families when possible. Their lived experiences and adoption reflections have emphasized the great importance of healthy racial and cultural self-identity and connection to birth culture. This can certainly be achieved by intentional, culturally competent, interracial adoptive parenting, but is most effectively achieved through placing children with a parent(s) that mirrors their racial and/or cultural background.

  As a result, Adoptions Together will be putting the highest value on race when making placement decisions for infants whose birth parents do not want to choose an adoptive family. In these circumstances, when possible, infants will be placed with the longest waiting family who has a matching profile and one or both adoptive parents is of the same race of the child. At the same time, we continue to support and celebrate interracial adoption and are committed to preparing prospective adoptive families to parent interracially as they are chosen by birth families.

Salary Transparency

• 2022 Update ▽

  In alignment with our organizational commitment to equity, several salary-related changes began in 2022 including updates to our salary guidelines, standardizing salaries for existing staff, and posting accurate salary ranges for all positions moving forward. Between January 1, 2021 and January 1, 2022, we made market adjustments to 100% of the job classification bands and made corresponding adjustments to individual salaries to bring them in line. In 2022 we will update our performance review system to include a wider range of feedback and merit-based salary increases.

2023-2025 Strategic Plan

• 2022 Update ▽

  2022 is the bridge year as we prepare our next strategic plan for years 2023-2025. SMARTIE Goals will be implemented, ensuring that we are infusing a DEI lens in creation of these pivotal goals for 2023-2025.

Trainings:

• 2021 Trainings ▽

  • Janice Goldwater, Founder & CEO, participated in the six month Anti-Racist Leadership Series through Leadership Greater Washington; and serves as a working member of Achieving Race Equity in Child Welfare (Maryland state-wide workgroup).
  • Audra Hurd, Operations Director, attended the Sorkin Center at Compass’ Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion Event that focused on what to consider and where to begin when developing culture, policies, and programs that support Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion within a nonprofit. Audra is also registered to attend a three-part Policy & Practice Training with the Human Rights Campaign’s All Children-All Families Project.
  • Adoptions Together has regular staff training and participated in the first of a series of all-staff Diversity & Inclusion Training, led by Kia Silver-Hodge, SPHR, CPEC, Coach and Inclusion Strategist.
  • Four members of our team are enrolled in the Helen J. Serini Foundation’s Equity, Diversity, and Inclusion Training. This multi-part series focuses on helping organizations create and sustain more inclusive environments by changing their cultures and identifying how their policies, practices, and procedures unwittingly create barriers to inclusion and belonging.
  • Staff members are participating in the Adoption Exchange Association’s educational programming focused on race and equity in the child welfare system. Some sessions include Reducing Racial Disproportionality Among Waiting Youth in Need of Permanency and We Must Do Better For Children: Race and Equity in Foster Care and Adoption.

• 2022 Trainings ▽

  • In October 2021, our team met for another All-Staff Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion Training with Kia Silver-Hodge, SPHR, CPEC, Coach and Inclusion Strategist and Beth Wheeler, LICSW, of Edges Education and Consulting, LLC. Last year’s session was led by thoughtful staff feedback collected anonymously and focused on discussion of our internal and external DEI practices, what progress has been made, and what we can do differently moving forward. It also focused on gaining a stronger understanding of gender, gender diversity, and how to continue providing inclusive care for individuals who identify as LGBTQIA+.
  • We will be working to ensure our DEI policies align with all staff levels and goals through additional consultant partnerships in 2022.
  • As an appointed member of the Maryland Council for the Prevention of Child Abuse and Neglect, Janice Goldwater serves as a member of the Achieving Racial Equity Workgroup that focuses on recommendations for an anti-racist child welfare system. She continues to participate in state-wide and community initiatives to grow her knowledge and ability to be catalyst for change in the child welfare system.

HRC Accreditations:

• 2021 ▽

  Adoptions Together is a recognized 2019 and 2020 Innovator of the Human Rights Campaign (HRC) Foundation’s All Children – All Families Project. HRC’s All Children – All Families, a project of the Human Rights Campaign Foundation, promotes LGBTQ inclusive policies and affirming practices among child welfare agencies and formally recognizes those agencies that are leading the field with innovative approaches to inclusion. All staff are currently involved in additional trainings as we work towards this achievement in 2021.

• 2022 ▽

  Adoptions Together was again honored to be recognized as a 2021 Innovator of the Human Rights Campaign (HRC) Foundation’s All Children – All Families Project. All staff are currently involved in additional trainings as we work towards this achievement in 2022.

Community Services:

Interracial Adoption Group (INTAG)

• 2021 Response ▽

  After hearing feedback from our existing Transracial Adoption Family Group, we added the Transracial Adoption Children’s Group to provide a safe space of emotional support for children and youth adopted transracially to engage in open discussion and guided activities focused on civic and cultural topics that impact their lives. This group aims to increase their consciousness of their resilience, self-worth, and the value they add to their family, community, and the world.

  We also revamped the private Transracial Adoption Facebook Group to provide increased opportunities for learning and interaction on a day-to-day basis.

• 2022 Update ▽

  Adoptions Together renamed the Transracial Adoption Groups the Interracial Adoption Groups (INTAG) after internal and external discussion and the conclusion that “transracial” may no longer be the most effective way to describe these families. With the societal awareness of, and advocacy around the word “transgender,” we want to reduce confusion that the word transracial can create. Using the word “interracial” or “racially diverse” or “mixed race” to describe the adoption of a child of one race by the parents of another race is more consistent with the practice and also better understood by the general community. The agency also significantly expanded the scope and frequency of group meetings in 2021, bringing in new team members with lived experience to help facilitate those discussions.

  The Interracial Adoption Facebook Group continues to be a catalyst for discussion, questions, and connection for those who have adopted interracially.

Interracial Adoption and Parenting Webinar

• 2021 Response ▽

  For the month of February, we have waived the registration fee for the Transracial-Transcultural Adoption and Parenting webinar. Families who adopt transracially or transculturally will face a unique set of concerns that require careful thought, preparation, and ongoing education. This webinar is designed to educate prospective and current foster and adoptive parents about the important issues involved in transracial and transcultural adoption including selecting a school and community that embraces differences, educating extended family members, responding to intrusive questions, and preparing your child to confront racism.

• 2022 Update ▽

  21 participants were able to increase their toolkit by viewing the Interracial Adoption and Parenting Webinar for free in February 2021. We are excited to again be offering this webinar for free during May 2022 which is National Foster Care Month.

In 2022, we are recommitting to the work and growth that lies ahead and will continue to provide updates of our progress and actions. As always, we welcome your feedback.