HRC Blog

Tomorrow at 10:00 a.m. Eastern Time, we hope you'll join the HRC Family Project for an Adoption Forum featuring Bryan Samuels, Commissioner of the Administration on Children, Youth and Families at the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services.  Also in attendance will be LGBT families, leaders in the child welfare profession, and HRC Family Project Director Ellen Kahn.  As National Adoption Month comes to a close, the forum will serve as a call to action for child welfare agencies to include LGBT families in efforts to find permanent families for children and youth in foster care.  In addition to the all-star lineup of child welfare experts and LGBT families, a new video by the HRC Family Project on LGBT adoption will be premiered at the forum.

To commemorate National Adoption Month, HRC has created a resource center for families considering adoption at http://www.hrc.org/issues/adoption with information about adoption agencies that work with LGBT families, answers to frequently asked questions about adoption and foster care, a video montage called Gay Parents Speak, featuring real parents telling their stories of adopting and loving children, and links to related programs and organizations.  HRC's “All Children – All Families” initiative, launched in 2007, promotes policies and practices that welcome LGBT foster and adoptive parents.  The program seeks to enhance LGBT cultural competence among child welfare professionals and educate LGBT people about opportunities to become foster or adoptive parents to waiting children.  To date, ACAF has 50 participating agencies across the country, and has awarded 16 seals of recognition. In September HRC launched a “50 state strategy,” with the goal of securing at least one ACAF-recognized adoption agency dedicated to working with LGBT families in every state.   More information about the initiative can be found at http://www.hrc.org/acaf

The forum will take place from 10:00 a.m. to 11:00 a.m. at the HRC building, 1640 Rhode Island Ave. NW, Washington, DC 20036 and streamed live at http://www.hrc.org/adoptionforum.