Description
Arms Wide Adoption Services' Foster Care Program provides a safe haven
home for abused or neglected children who have been removed from their
birth homes and placed in the protective custody of DFPS. The Foster
Care Program has two core components: 1) temporary foster care and 2)
foster-to-adopt. Temporary foster care provides safe, nurturing homes
for children who are waiting for the outcome of their permanency plan,
which may include adoption, being returned to birth parents, kinship
placement or remaining in state care. The foster-to-adopt component
identifies children whose permanency plan is likely to be adoption and
places them with foster parents who desire to foster them with the
ultimate goal of an adoption finalization. This approach reduces the
number of moves the children have to endure, lessening the trauma they
experience in DFPS custody.
Population Served
Children and Youth (0 - 19 years) / Families / At-Risk Populations
Program Long-Term Success
Arms Wide Adoption Services' Foster Care Program provides a safe home for abused or neglected children who have been removed from their birth homes and placed in the custody of DFPS. Through this program, foster families are recruited, trained and supported through the joys and challenges of providing temporary care to children in need. Families are motivated by a love for children and a desire to see them protected during an uncertain time of their lives.
Once a foster placement is made, the family is supported by a Foster Care Coordinator through the following services: weekly phone calls, monthly visits, on-going training, provider referrals, and access to support 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. For some children, their foster placement is the first time they have lived with appropriate, consistent caregivers, and while these children do not remain with these families permanently, they do learn how to recognize safe, protective adults, a trait that serves them well in the future.
Program Short-Term Success
The Foster Care Program provided through our Houston office supports the Arms Wide Adoption Services mission by providing a safe haven home for abused or neglected children who have been removed from their birth homes and placed in the protective custody of the State of Texas.
In 2018, Arms Wide Adoption Services' Foster Care Program:
- Provided 10,997 days of care for 63 children in the Greater Houston area.
- Facilitated the adoption of 13 children who were adopted by their foster parents.
- Maintained a superior success rate in which 100% of children were safe in care.
In 2018, Arms Wide Adoption Services' largest Foster Care placement was a sibling group of four. The oldest child placed in Foster Care was 18 years old and the youngest child was one day old.
Program Success Monitored ByHelpOrganizations describe the tools used to measure or track program impact.
Arms Wide Adoption Services monitors the key indicators and progress of outcomes and outputs on a monthly basis through a monitoring tool used by the Leadership Team and Arms Wide Adoption Services’ Board of Directors. This local tool is termed Program Information Report (PIR). Case coordinators and supervisors conduct the direct informational input into Kaleidacare as the information is gathered. Information is gathered through telephone contact, face to face contact and electronic mail or traditional mail. The monthly information is converted to numerical points that are placed in to the PIR tool by supervisory staff level and above. The monthly report from the PIR is reviewed by the leadership team during a monthly team meeting to monitor measurement points, identifying gaps and needs, as well as strengths within programs. Input on outputs/outcomes from stakeholders such as the child in care or the adoptive, foster or post adoption family is also addressed during the monthly leadership team meeting with final outcomes included in the annual report. Any needed adjustments in work product are made through planning at this time. Information is gathered through face to face contact with clients, community members, input from professionals with direct family interaction and additional stakeholder information from traditional mail, electronic mail, and telephone and survey tool. The monthly data points are monitored by the leadership team initially then the entire agency on a quarterly basis and shared with the stakeholders on an annual basis.
Description
The Special Needs Adoption Program provides permanent, nurturing
families for abused, neglected and abandoned children in DFPS care.
Prospective adoptive families are recruited, educated, trained, and
supported through the joys and challenges of parenting a child who has
experienced trauma as a result of past abuse or neglect. The children
served by the program range in age from newborn to 17 years old and are
often identified by the state as having one or more special needs that
make adoptive placement more difficult. These special needs categories
include older children, sibling groups, minority children and children
with diagnosed physical, mental or emotional disabilities. The program
also serves families who are 21 years of age or older, married or
single, and reside in CPS’ Region 6, which includes the Greater Houston
area, and CPS’ Region 11, which comprises the South Texas area.
Population Served
Children and Youth (0 - 19 years) / Families / At-Risk Populations
Program Long-Term Success
Arms Wide Adoption Services' Special Needs Adoption Program focuses on placing children identified by DFPS as having one or more special needs, which include 1) minority children over two; 2) Caucasian children over six; 3) sibling groups of any size; and 4) children with disabilities or delays. These children typically wait longer than their peers to be adopted and are at increased risk of aging out of the foster care system.
Poor outcomes for children who age out of foster care illustrate the importance of Arms Wide Adoption Services' Special Needs Adoption Program. Within two years of aging out, at least 25% of former foster youth experience homelessness, while another 25% end up in prison. Within four years, 60% will become parents to children of their own, and those children are twice as likely to be placed in foster care.
By connecting foster children with adoptive families before they turn 18 years old, their chance of future success increases exponentially.
Program Short-Term Success
Adoption services are provided through our Houston and South Texas offices which serve 32 counties in Texas. The Special Needs Adoption Program consists of several components: recruitment, training, placement, and finalization. These services are offered free of charge to families, eliminating significant financial barriers for prospective parents.
In 2018, the Special Needs Adoption Program:
- Placed 24 children in permanent families.
- Finalized 22 adoptions where children officially became part of their forever families.
- Maintained a superior success rate in which 100% of adoptive placements became finalized adoptions.
In 2018, the largest placement through the Special Needs Adoption Program was a sibling group of four. The oldest child in adoptive placement was 16 years old and the youngest was 1 year old.
Program Success Monitored ByHelpOrganizations describe the tools used to measure or track program impact.
Arms Wide Adoption Services monitors the key indicators and progress of
outcomes and outputs on a monthly basis through a monitoring tool used
by the Leadership Team and Arms Wide Adoption Services’ Board of
Directors. This local tool is termed Program Information Report (PIR).
Case coordinators and supervisors conduct the direct informational input
into Kaleidacare as the information is gathered. Information is
gathered through telephone contact, face to face contact and electronic
mail or traditional mail. The monthly information is converted to
numerical points that are placed in to the PIR tool by supervisory staff
level and above. The monthly report from the PIR is reviewed by the
leadership team during a monthly team meeting to monitor measurement
points, identifying gaps and needs, as well as strengths within
programs. Input on outputs/outcomes from stakeholders such as the child
in care or the adoptive, foster or post adoption family is also
addressed during the monthly leadership team meeting with final outcomes
included in the annual report. Any needed adjustments in work product
are made through planning at this time. Information is gathered through
face to face contact with clients, community members, input from
professionals with direct family interaction and additional stakeholder
information from traditional mail, electronic mail, and telephone and
survey tool. The monthly data points are monitored by the leadership
team initially then the entire agency on a quarterly basis and shared
with the stakeholders on an annual basis.
Description
The Post Adoption Program provides ongoing support services to those who
adopted a child/children from DFPS custody. The Post Adoption Program
is designed to: 1) resolve adoption issues; 2) strengthen family
functioning; 3) increase the quality of life for all family members; and
ultimately 4) ensure the family remains intact. Services of the program
include 24-hour crisis assistance, case management, information and
referral resources, respite care, educational seminars, parent training,
support groups, and counseling and treatment services. All services are
provided until the youngest DFPS adoptee in an adoptive family reaches
the age of 18. Arms Wide Adoption Services is one of only four agencies
in Texas providing post adoption services to families who have adopted a
child/children from the state foster care system.
Population Served
Families / Children and Youth (0 - 19 years) / At-Risk Populations
Program Long-Term Success
Arms Wide Adoption Services is only one of two agencies in the Greater Houston area, and one of only four agencies in the state, providing post adoption services to families who have adopted children from DFPS.
The Post Adoption Program is designed to: 1) resolve adoption challenges; 2) strengthen family functioning; 3) increase the quality of life for all family members; and 4) ensure the adoption is successful. Services of the program include 24-hour crisis assistance, case management, information and referral resources, respite care, educational seminars, parent training, peer support groups, therapy and counseling, and treatment services. All post adoption support services are provided free of charge and until the youngest DFPS adoptee in an adoptive family reaches the age of 18.
Post adoption support services are critical to the emotional and mental health of adoptive children and families so they can achieve healthy, stable and enduring family relationships.
Program Short-Term Success
Post Adoption services are provided through Arms Wide Adoption Services' Houston and South Texas offices. Our Post Adoption Program began in 1988 to provide on-going support to children who were adopted from the Texas foster care system and their adoptive parents. The program is designed to protect, strengthen, and preserve the new adoptive families, so that they may remain together.
In 2018, the Post Adoption Program provided:
- 1,016 hours of therapy.
- 834 days of respite services.
- A therapeutic weekend of camp to 19 families.
In 2018, Arms Wide Adoption Services enabled 99% of the children served by the Post Adoption Program to remain with their adoptive families. The Post Adoption Program served 461 children and provided 3,290 hours of case management services.
Program Success Monitored ByHelpOrganizations describe the tools used to measure or track program impact.
Outcomes, key indicators and outputs for measurement of the post adoption program performance are identified through contractual terms that are a part of the Health and Human Services DFPS contract procurement requirements with Arms Wide Adoption Services. Arms Wide Adoption Services utilizes KaleidaCare (web-based client management system) to collect the
data points needed for producing the outcomes and output reports. Arms Wide Adoption Services monitors the key indicators
and progress of outcomes and outputs on a monthly basis through a monitoring tool used by the Leadership Team and Arms
Wide Adoption Services’ Board of Directors. This local tool is termed Program Information Report (PIR). Post Adoption case managers and supervisors conduct the direct informational input into KaleidaCare as the information is gathered. Information is gathered through telephone contact, face to face contact and electronic mail or traditional mail. The monthly information is converted to numerical points that are placed in to the PIR tool by supervisory staff level and above. The monthly report from the PIR is reviewed by the leadership team during a monthly team meeting to monitor measurement points, identifying gaps and needs, as well as strengths within programs. Input on outputs/outcomes from stakeholders such as the child in care or the adoptive, foster or post adoption family is also addressed during the monthly leadership team meeting with final outcomes included in the annual report. Any needed adjustments in work product are made through planning at this time.
Description
In 2017, Arms Wide Adoption Services began offering post permanency
support to families in Permanent Managing Conservatorships (PMC), where
adults were awarded legal guardianship of a child but were unable to
formally consummate an adoption due to legal constraints in terminating
parental rights. This largely mirrors the services offered through our
Post Adoption Program and includes case management, resource referral,
respite care and various therapeutic services, with the exception of
inpatient care at a Residential Treatment Center. Arms Wide is the only
agency in the state offering post permanency support services to PMC
families, who have historically been underserved and often do not have
the means to seek out paid family support services.
Population Served
Families / Children and Youth (0 - 19 years) / Adults
Program Long-Term Success
The Post Permanency Program supports families in Permanent Managing Conservatorships (PMC), where adults were awarded legal guardianship of a child but were unable to formally consummate an adoption due to legal constraints in terminating parental rights. Services provided include case management, respite care, education, support groups, therapeutic camping, and counseling services designed to resolve adoption issues, to strengthen family functioning and to increase the quality of life for all family members. Parents who legally take on parenting a special needs child need support and education to avoid becoming emotionally depleted or discouraged by the demands of parenting their child. Respite, education, and on-going support groups help parents understand what is happening in their families so they can support their child while preventing feelings of failure as parents. The goal of post permanency services is to strengthen the family so they can remain intact. Without these services, many of these children would end up in the custody of DFPS.
Program Short-Term Success
Post Permanency services are provided through Arms Wide Adoption Services' Houston and South Texas offices. Our Post Adoption Program began in 2017 to support families in Permanent Managing Conservatorships (PMC), where adults were awarded legal guardianship of a child but were unable to formally consummate an adoption due to legal constraints in terminating parental rights. The program is designed to protect, strengthen, and preserve the new families, so that they may remain together.
In 2018, the Post Permanency Program provided:
- Services to 1,341 children.
- 1,072 hours of case management services.
- 516 days of respite services.
Program Success Monitored ByHelpOrganizations describe the tools used to measure or track program impact.
Outcomes, key indicators and outputs for measurement of the post
permanency program performance are identified through contractual terms
that are a part of the Health and Human Services DFPS contract
procurement requirements with Arms Wide Adoption Services. Arms Wide
Adoption Services utilizes KaleidaCare (web-based client management
system) to collect the
data points needed for producing the outcomes and output reports. Arms
Wide Adoption Services monitors the key indicators
and progress of outcomes and outputs on a monthly basis through a
monitoring tool used by the Leadership Team and Arms
Wide Adoption Services’ Board of Directors. This local tool is termed
Program Information Report (PIR). Post Permanency case managers and
supervisors conduct the direct informational input into KaleidaCare as
the information is gathered. Information is gathered through telephone
contact, face to face contact and electronic mail or traditional mail.
The monthly information is converted to numerical points that are placed
in to the PIR tool by supervisory staff level and above. The monthly
report from the PIR is reviewed by the leadership team during a monthly
team meeting to monitor measurement points, identifying gaps and needs,
as well as strengths within programs. Input on outputs/outcomes from
stakeholders such as the child in care or the adoptive, foster or post
adoption family is also addressed during the monthly leadership team
meeting with final outcomes included in the annual report. Any needed
adjustments in work product are made through planning at this time.