Infant Adoption Get Started

The Home Study

The home study is a mutual educational process during which families learn about the uniqueness of adoptive parenting and we learn about how a family's life experiences have prepared them for adoptive parenting.

The Commonwealth of Virginia requires the home study to include a minimum of three face-to-face visits between the client and the social worker. Typically the second visit is conducted in the client's home. During the home study process, Coordinators²inc requires our families to attend two workshops. The workshops, Core Issues in Adoption and Identity and Adoption are great classes for prospective adoptive parents to think and process through many of the issues and emotions that encompass becoming an adoptive family. The home study process also includes completing the required paperwork: state criminal sex offender and criminal history background checks, DMV checks, medical forms, financial statement, employment verifications, letters from references and counselors (if applicable), sworn disclosure statements, copies of marriage, divorce and death certificates if applicable, signed corporal punishment and acknowledgement forms. Coordinators²inc also provides our clients with an outline to write an autobiography that is a critical part of the home study process. We also require our clients to write birth parent letters, writing from the perspective if they were placing their child for adoption.

We believe the home study process is an opportunity to educate and assist families as they prepare to become adoptive parents, for every family is a potentially valuable resource for one of our children.

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INFANT ADOPTION - HOW TO GET STARTED