Child Adoption Centers

The National Adoption Center is an organization that provides free adoptive services that increase public awareness of adoptable children, the recruitment of foster and adoptive parents, information and referral for adoptive families and publications.

Child adoption centers like this, seek to increase the interest in older child adoption, which is the cheapest adoption option as well as the least common first-choice for first-time adopters. Older children are harder to place because many have special needs and emotional problems that some adopters do not feel comfortable dealing with.

The motto for the National Adoption Center responds best to the attitude toward older child adoption: "There are no unwanted children, just unfound families." Even adoptive parents can complicate the placement process if their deemed nontraditional adopters, and child adoption centers are a great place for these adopters to familiarize themselves with the adoptable children available to them. Some centers may have match parties, which allow prospective parents to interact face-to-face with children. The National Adoption Center is an example of one that works regardless of state lines to match children with the household best suited for them. They have open record policies and support equal-opportunity placements for nontraditional adopters.

According to the 2010 annual report by the National Adoption Center, 62 percent of the children placed were African-American and 97 percent of them were school-aged (between 6 and 18).