Children’s Bureau Message for National Adoption Month 2024

National Adoption Month (NAM) in November is a time to raise awareness about adoption and bring attention to the 109,000 children with legal permanency goals of adoption who are at risk of aging out of foster care without permanent family connections. This year’s NAM theme—"Honoring Youth: Strengthening Pathways for Lasting Bonds”—highlights the importance of child welfare professionals helping young people build and sustain lifelong networks of support and community that provide a sense of belonging and relational permanency. This theme reflects one of the Children’s Bureau’s highest priorities: ensuring youth benefit from lasting relationships and have holistic supports and opportunities.

Young people deserve a strong support network that meets their needs, embraces and affirms their identity, and promotes family, community, and cultural connections. Supportive relationships act as a protective factor that can contribute to improved well-being outcomes. Child welfare professionals and others should help young people find and nurture these connections as soon as they become involved with the child welfare system and then promote these bonds over time. This includes helping youth maintain existing relationships with family and friends; develop new connections with peers, mentors, and others; and build trusting bonds with adoptive family members before and after adoption. A trusting, supportive youth-caseworker relationship can be an important part of a young person’s support network. Child welfare professionals should explore strategies to help them connect with youth, which can include talking to them about their interests, helping them work through challenges, listening attentively, and authentically engaging and empowering them, especially concerning permanency decisions. By honoring every youth and their network, professionals can work toward an adoption journey that is meaningful and purposeful, paving the way for healing, well-being, and long-term stability.

Supportive, lasting bonds for youth should extend beyond connections with their adoptive families and include their family of origin. These relationships, as well as connections to their culture, can help young people build their sense of identity and belonging. To preserve culture, child welfare professionals should connect youth with adoptive families that embrace and honor youth's racial, ethnic, and cultural backgrounds. Child welfare agencies should recruit and support adoptive families that reflect the diversity of those waiting to be adopted. In addition, child welfare agencies should explore permanency with kin, prioritize kin placements, and promote kin foster care licensing. These steps are essential to creating a kin-first culture in child welfare, which recognizes the importance of involving relatives, emphasizes relative adoption, and provides meaningful supports to children, youth, and families to help them stay connected. This approach also honors the valuable role of relatives, close family friends, community elders, and other influential adults in youth's sustained well-being and overall development.  

I invite child welfare professionals and others to visit the NAM website and explore the resources and tools available to support your work with young people on the path to permanency. Join us in recognizing NAM by celebrating adoptive families, adopted youth, youth in foster care awaiting permanency, and the professionals who support them. Together we can raise awareness about the importance of enhancing engagement with youth; preserving their racial, ethnic, and cultural heritage; and strengthening pathways for sustained lifelong connections for young people.

Written By Commissioner Rebecca Jones Gaston