Are there american orphanages

Foster care is supplanting orphanages simply because foster care is more economical and not because foster care is inherently better for children -- though there are many people who will support the movement to foster care with anecdotes of institutional abuses in orphanages. There is no book on foster care that captures the popular imagination that would mirror the stereotypical terrible orphanage of Oliver Twist. There is no "meme" or idiom to oversimplify the foster care situation as there is in media addressing orphanages.

These oversimplifications confuse complex issues and do a great disservice to children. In ten years, I never knew a child at Thornwell to die or be hospitalized for physical abuse or neglect or to simply "disappear" from supervision. Now, some foster parents are motivated by altruism or religion to foster children and do a great job at fostering. But it is a well-known and little-discussed "secret" that there are many foster parents who foster children for money rather than altruism and religious belief.

Newspapers do report from time to time of children in those homes dying, requiring hospitalization for physical abuse or neglect, or simply disappearing. People tell themselves that such incidents are rare, that there are bureaucratic safeguards in place to prevent this, or that such events are inevitable. In a well-run orphanage - such as Thornwell today - these events are not rare or inevitable. They simply do not happen or, if they do, the severity is much less and the duration is much shorter.

Because orphanages are, first and foremost, communities. It is impossible to keep secrets in communities. It is often simple to hide abuse and neglect in a small family unit - even in the biologically-related single-family unit which is the typical family unit.

It is even simpler to hide abuse in a foster family unit. In a well-run orphanage, with screening of adult supervisors, institutional precautions and protocols, and a variety of unrelated and overlapping adults interacting with the children, it is nearly impossible.

Here is the simple truth: Some children do not thrive in foster care. Think about that. Foster care is a "one-size-fits-all" approach to child care. What if a child comes from a large family?

Then, there might not be a foster family that can accommodate four or more children. The sibling group is split among foster families and may never develop normal, affectionate sibling bonds, which help build coping skills and teach responsibility. In this type of adoption, hopeful adoptive parents are matched with an expectant mother during her pregnancy and then adopt the baby when he or she is born.

In addition to the three forms of domestic adoption, there is international adoption. While orphanage adoption is a thing of the past in the United States, hopeful parents who wonder how to adopt a child from an orphanage should look into international adoption. Worldwide, there are an estimated 18 million orphans currently living in orphanages or on the streets.

Families adopting from countries like China and Haiti commonly adopt from these orphanages. However, it is important to keep in mind that not all children in orphanages are adoptable, and not all will qualify as an orphan under U. In many countries without a foster care system, orphanages are sometimes used as temporary homes for children whose parents are working toward reunification.

For example, parents who are experiencing financial hardship may place their children in an orphanage until they are able to care for them. International adoptive parents should do careful research and work with reputable organizations with extensive experience in handling international adoptions to ensure the child they are adopting truly is an orphan in need of an adoptive home.

By adopting from the U. Disclaimer Information available through these links is the sole property of the companies and organizations listed therein.

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For sure! Not all vulnerable kids ended up in orphanages. There was this thing called the Orphan Train…. He later initiated the Orphan Train Movement where over , orphaned children were sent by train to farms across the country. It was a flawed system i.