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(Music) When I first put there that me, I was surprised, like, wow, I'm going to be able to live in a family that cared about me and stuff as soon as I got adopted.

So I felt like I was really going to be a part of something like that.

I would love to say, hey, you could say Mom and dad, it has made for real great being adopted.

It makes me feel happy to make because I know now that I have parents that love me and that will take care of me.

And I have a family that will also love me and take care of.

Narrator: Not all children in the United States grow up with the memories and support that are the hallmark of the strong and stable American family.

Yet it's a dream of every child to feel like they are loved and cared for in their own special way.

Each year there are over a half million American children warehoused in our expensive, well-meaning but unfortunately flawed foster care system.

Early on, E.T.

ended on president of Adopt America Network, recognized that this was not an ideal environment for children.

Edieann Didham: Foster care was established to get children who were in bad situations, in safe situations, foster care replaced the old orphanage system.

Foster care was a haven when children were in need that was never intended to be a place where children grew up.

Denny Lynch: Most of them got into foster care because of problems with the family, but the children probably didn't do anything and now they don't have permanent parents.

So they are stuck in a system where adults are telling them that they're going to this home or that home and they don't have control over any of this.

And they made it impossible for the foster care families to adopt those children.

And the rationale for that was that if the foster care families could adopt, then they would not be as supportive for reunification as they could be.

And that also the state would lose some of its best foster care families because they would choose to adopt rather than stay in the foster care system.

Narrator: These children spend an average of seven years in foster care and have an average of six different foster placements with prospective parents that are limited to local geography.

Jim Denham recalls his experience moving through the foster care system.

Jim Didham: I think what I remember most about foster care is that in every situation you knew it was going to be temporary.

And given that you just had no desire to become a real part of that family, you were always going to withhold emotion, love, whatever it is.

The bonding just isn't going to happen.

Narrator: Brothers Tyler and Michael remember their foster care experience.

Tyler: It was okay.

They cared for me.

They did what they were supposed to and everything.

But I never really felt permanently there it was.

I knew it was temporary, so I was.

Just.

Not really into it.

It was it was a nice experience.

I had people that were taking care of my needs and everything, but I just really wanted more.

I didn't want to just foster parents.

I would just care for me.

I wanted somebody to actually be there for me.

24 se ven.

Michael: The hardest part about being in foster care was not being able to get close to anybody or having someone to go to and talk to about things.

Narrator: This is clearly not the environment that produces socially well-adjusted children who will take productive roles within their community.

Denny Lynch, president of the Dave Thomas Foundation, explains what happens to young people after their foster care experience comes to an end.

Denny Lynch: At age 18, you age out of the foster care system.

The government now says, Well, you're an adult, take care of yourself, but what skills are we taught them?

How have we taught them how to be a productive American?

How do how we taught them that they are supposed to treat others the way they were treated?

Well, how are they treated?

Edieann Didham: It's sad.

It's a national tragedy.

There are 30,000 children every year for turn 18.

If we didn't pay early on in terms of whatever it might have cost to get those kids adopted, we're going to pay later.

Jim Didham: I guess from a personal perspective, it didn't work very well.

I mean, I can look back and say they were nice people, but it was it seemed to me to always be a very cold arrangement.

There wasn't a bonding.

I didn't feel like I was part of that family, even if there were other children there, because you saw it as a temporary situation.

I think the adults saw it as a temporary situation.

And I think also by that time, because I had moved to so many different situations, I'd become very independent.

So it was hard for me to really put myself in that family and be a part of it.

Didn't work very.

Well.

Edieann Didham: In a typical county where children are entering foster care and much of the resources, the staffing and the finances have to be directed to finding foster homes for those children, there isn't as much emphasis usually placed on adopting the children.

Denny Lynch: We've been to so many events where the foster children are there and you meet them and you talk to them and you say, Wow, how is this child available?

How come this child is not adopted and it just breaks your heart?

You you you talk to these children.

They still have hope.

They have they have dreams.

They want to do things.

And all they need is some guidance.

All they need is permanency.

All they need is someone to love them.

And you and you.

And you talk to them and you meet them.

They're individuals.

They're not a case number.

They are not someone else's problem.

There our responsibility.

They're American kids.

They're our responsibility.

And all we have to do is take care of.

Narrator: It is with these concerns that AAN Adopt America Network was founded in 1983 by Richard K Ransom, also the founder of Hickory Farms, Inc., founded as Ask the Midwest or Adopt a Special Kid Ransom.

I saw a huge contrast between the lives of children who had a place to call home and those who were housed in public institutions or being moved through the foster care system from home to home.

Richard Ransom: We had a a national program that was in California, and but they couldn't reach Ohio and in other places like this.

So a lot of our children here were not really being taken care of.

So that's when we decided to start asking Midwest here.

Narrator: Ransom saw that children with families had hope, stability and the loving guidance that was so sorely missing from the lives of the children who were confined to the local and state run programs.

Ransom has dedicated his life to helping children, and since he established a N over 2400 special needs children have found Homes and Families Adopt.

America Network is now placing over 200 special needs children from U.S. foster care.

Each year.

Richard Ransom: I look at the number of kids that we have adopted and very happy with that, but we're not really very happy with the number of kids out there that are not adopted.

That's a big challenge to us yet.

Denny Lynch: This is a great time to be in the country to talk about adoption because it is looked upon as a positive solution to some of the society's concerns and issues.

Ronnie: It is literally life changing.

It has changed my life.

And if we were to ask me, you know, if you were to do this over again, Ronnie, would you do it over differently or would you not have done it?

I would boldly say to you, through all of the ups and downs, through all of the headaches and the heartaches, I wouldn't have traded adoption for anything in the world.

It is by far the best decision I've ever, ever made.

David: The greatest thing was to actually have somebody to come and adopt me.

That was the greatest thing, because at the time I wasn't I wasn't the brightest or the smartest or the best kid on the block.

But I was pretty bad.

I was a real bad dude But it was having somebody there who looked to all that or that a little bad stuff and still saw some good in me and he took it upon himself to adopt me.

Denny Lynch: You know, psychologist tell us that our values are formulated in the initial years of childhood, very early on in our lives, at least in my situation, and I think in the adoption situation, values can change.

David: Adoption wasn't a big thing to me because I was growing when I got adopted.

I was 16, going on 17.

So for me to think of a father was way out of my league.

It was way out of my mind.

I wasn't even thinking about having no father.

I mean, even he can tell you all of that was the last thing on my mind.

And I'm kind of happy that I did get adopted because I have somebody to call a father, you know, and I could call him and live with our pops.

And how you doing?

And this and that.

Ronnie: I was with my son to a lot of things through getting in trouble with the law, through being locked up and being in prison and and to selling drugs.

I'd gotten so bad one time even he had even begin selling drugs in front of our house on Sunday morning of all days.

And I'm a minister, so that really hurt my heart.

But something always told me deep inside, you can't give up, you can't turn your back on it.

And I did it through all the name calling, all the the anger.

And I look at him today and I say to myself sometime, what would have happened had I given up on my son?

Where would he be?

Or would he even be alive?

And the rewards for adoption are much, much greater than the negative.

If we can only get America to realize that.

Today Narrator: Adopt America Network as a national nonprofit adoption organization based in Toledo, Ohio, that provides adoption, matching and support services on a national level.

To help ease the transition from the foster care system to adoption, Adopt America Network serves these children and their belief that every child deserves a home and believes that home and family are essential to the well-being of every child.

The mission of Adopt America Network is to find homes for special needs children.

Most of these children can be defined as children who have physical, mental or emotional challenges.

Children who are older, part of a sibling group, or children who are minorities or mixed ethnically.

The Dave Thomas Foundation created by Dave Thomas, the founder of Wendy's who was himself adopted, focuses on increasing adoption awareness while supporting model adoption service programs.

Denny Lynch: Dave Thomas Foundation is a grant grantmaking organization and we work with fabulous adoption organizations across America.

One of them is Adopt America Network and they do wonderful work in recruiting prospective parents to consider adoption and to go through the process of being adoption.

And one of the unique programs that they have proven successfully time and time again is they do home studies for prospective parents and anybody going through the adoption process has to have a home study.

They also work very closely in the communities, they recruit volunteers in the respective communities, and those volunteers then look for prospective parents.

So they have these grass roots network and community after community in states across the nation that that work one on one to find prospective parents and then match them with foster children.

It's a great idea.

And it's working.

Wendy Spoerl: That's what we do.

We try to work in coordination and cooperation with the caseworkers, with our county and state child welfare systems, so that we can step in, we can find those families, we can train those families and then do the matching of those children to families in a way that is both effective and efficient.

Sue & Olivia: Initially, to become an adoptive parent, I contacted Adopt America and enrolled in a class, learned the different aspects of adoption and what the different special needs would be as a parent and then had to get a home study.

They had a social worker come here from adopt America and look at the house.

Is it safe?

Is it suitable for a child to live in?

We were told you could have an apartment or house and so you didn't have to have the bedroom totally done.

I did.

I was all excited.

And then afterwards, you have a fire inspection.

That was it.

Edieann Didham: We don't say as many of the social service agencies do.

We'll work with you, but you'll adopt a child from our county agency.

We have children all over the nation in foster care.

And if the right child for a family or the right children happens to be in California or Maine or Idaho, it doesn't matter.

We'll bring that family together.

Bill McGinnis: And when we do get a match and we introduce the family and the children to each other, the combination of our staff here and the adoption specialists work through the bureaucracy that needs to be circumvented.

Do to make the adoption work.

Tyler: When I saw the van roll up in the driveway, I was jumping on the trampoline.

I jumped right off started darting towards van.

It was like I saw him come out.

I just knew that they were my parents.

I was finally going to be part of a permanent family.

I was just jumping for joy.

That was just the best moment in my life right there.

Linda: My husband and I were married for 13 years and we always wanted children.

And when we were unable to have them, the day that we were told we were getting these four children and it was final, we went out and celebrated and we have just enjoyed our family ever since spending time with our children, going to church functions, seeing them grow up, going through the the fun times, the hard times, the sad times.

Russ: Becoming an adoptive parent.

Makes me feel proud because I'm as proud of my children as any.

Parent would be of their children.

I'm proud that I took on the responsibility of the children and.

Have raised them successfully and they're doing very good in school.

And proud is the only word I can use to explain how it makes me feel.

David: I would have to say that it's real good for kids to look to look for adoption as a as a good thing because you got and you actually have people out there that cares about you.

You know, there's actually somebody out there and I didn't even know I have somebody caring about me.

Like, that is real good.

Narrator: You need to adopt.

America Network is its network of trained adoption specialist volunteers spread across the nation.

Each of these specialists are adoptive parents of special needs children and have been very successful raising their own families.

This innovative model, which combines both professionals and volunteers, was developed to effectively and efficiently match children and placed them in permanent homes more rapidly and less expensively than the traditional adoption placement system.

Bev Moore: The families really trust the adoption specialist and staff.

The adoption specialist have adopted.

They've been through the system.

They know how things work, they know the frustrations of waiting and can help them through all this.

And they're very, very trusted and again, become friends of the families, not just as not just an agency where we're friends or family.

Edieann Didham:We now have approximately 75 adoption specialist volunteers in the field that we've trained and we're growing all the time.

We've organized around teams, matching teams with people here in the Toledo office who are well-trained adoption specialists and aware of adoption services that work with maybe 15 to 20 of our volunteers at one time.

I think the model is just beginning to really, really be productive here with this new matching system we have and this database where we can find families and children and do that extremely efficiently, that we ought to be able to place hundreds of children every year.

Kris Housley: For me, being a volunteer and helping the families get their children, I feel like I'm doing what I'm supposed to do.

I enjoy just watching the kids come home.

If a match falls through and they don't end up getting matched with a child, I cry right along with the families.

So it's just it's a it's a really good feeling to know that you had just a small part of that child getting out of the system.

Sue: Adopt America Network was the reason we were able to adopt.

They walked me through every step of the way, so their value as an agency and the individual staff that are there as an extension of our family.

Denny Lynch: I mean, the joy is adoption transfer beyond the child.

It's to the family and it's the extended family, the aunts, uncles, the cousins.

It is a win win situation for everyone.

Bill McGinnis: I think if you look over time, there are going to be thousands of adults out there who have been given a second chance at their life because of Adopt America.

Edieann Didham: Being part of Ad and stepping in as a president and actually seeing miracles happen when kids went home, kids who were so crushed and defeated and had such great problems and then being adopted by someone and watching them a year later or two years later and seeing how tremendously healing it was to be part of a family, that was the biggest payoff and reward I've had in my entire career.

Jim Didham: If you're willing to take a special needs child and you're willing to show the love, give them the caring, give them a strong sense of family and community to get them involved, be patient, because there are going to be difficult times and some real problems to deal with.

But if you're willing to do that, you can perform miracles.

Narrator: as the cost of foster care, both financial and societal, continues to rise, and the number of children being placed in the foster care system continues to grow, it is important for us to understand the needs of these children.

The vast majority of these children wait several years, if ever, to be adopted.

Although there is no immediate solution.

Adopt America Network is working toward placing special needs children in a cost effective, efficient manner.

The hope is that there are enough families out there willing to help in some way for these children to become positive and productive adults in our society.

The greatest reward is the fulfillment of knowing that you're touching a child's life, creating support through families, fostering hope and dreams, and perhaps saving a life.

Wendy Spoerl: At this point, there's a huge need for families who feel like they can take on a challenge and want to give something.

These are kids that have a place.

They they need to know what that place is.

They need a place to call home.

And so there is a great need for people to step forward and say, I think I might be able to do that.

Richard Ransom: We just really need more of everything.

We need more money.

We need more people.

We need more people to adopt the children.

We just need more people to care.

Russ: If you have the.

Room in your heart, in your home for these children, you should definitely go ahead and do that because these children need a home and you're going to make a huge difference in the life of.

One person or more if you choose to adopt more than one.

David: The only thing I can say for anybody who is planning on adopting a child is you never know how well you're going to bring up his day or her day by just learning from letting them know that there's actually somebody out there that cares about you.

Wendy Spoerl: It is important th to focus on those children.

They remain our future.

And if we're to give them the opportunity to become the full, productive adult that we know they can be and that they deserve to be at, then we need to pay attention to those children and to their rights and to match them with families who are waiting.

Ronnie: To adopt action is the way to go.

Not only if you're single, not only if you have no children, but even if you have existing birth children already there will be a wonderful addition to your family because you have to remember it is not the fault of a foster child that they're in foster care.

They do not deserve to end up in foster care.

It was not their choice, but it was because someone gave up on them.

So why should we punish an innocent child?

It was not their fault.

Give them a chance.

Keep a few.

And watch what happens.

(Music)