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We Heard You: NCAP to Fill Gap Left by Donaldson Institute … and More

8/13/2019

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Two on Our Team Publish Important New Book 
Amanda Baden Joins NCAP as a Senior Fellow

BOSTON, Aug. xx, 2019 – The National Center on Adoption and Permanency announced today that, over the coming months, it will begin disseminating research-based publications comparable to those issued by the Donaldson Adoption Institute (DAI) before it closed last year. As part of this expansion of NCAP’s mission, the accomplished scholar Amanda Baden, PhD, will become our 11th Senior Research Fellow on Sept. 1.

The decision to fill the gap left by DAI’s closure coincides with the publication of an important new book, “
Seven Core Issues in Adoption and Permanency: A Comprehensive Guide to Promoting Understanding and Healing in Adoption, Foster Care, Kinship Families and Third Party Reproduction,” by Sharon Kaplan Roszia, who is an NCAP team member, and Allison Davis Maxon, who is NCAP’s Executive Director.


Learn more about Sharon and Allison’s book on NCAP’s website, and then order a copy! 

“We’re so proud that Amanda is joining us and that `Seven Core Issues’ is already making a real contribution to professionals and families,” said Maxon. “Most of all, I’m delighted that NCAP is responding to all the professionals, educators, advocacy organizations, policy-makers, members of the extended family of adoption, and so many others who keep telling us how much they miss the work Donaldson’s used to do. And, given the people on NCAP’s team, it makes perfect sense that we’ll be the ones to do that work again.”

Maxon was referring to 10 of her current colleagues, who came to NCAP from the Donaldson Institute several years before its closure in early 2018. They include
Adam Pertman, who headed DAI and originated/edited its publications for almost a dozen years before leaving to found NCAP; David Brodzinsky, Susan Livingston Smith and Jeanne Howard, who were DAI’s lead researchers and report authors and now hold various positions at NCAP; Bruce Boyer, an NCAP team member who was on DAI’s Board of Directors; and several current NCAP Senior Research Fellows – Ruth McRoy, Dana Johnson, Abbie Goldberg, Laurie Miller and Ellen Pinderhughes – who held the same title at DAI. 

Baden, a professor at Montclair State University in New Jersey, was also previously a Senior Fellow at DAI. Read all of our team’s bios, as well as information about our unique work, at www.ncap-us.org. ​

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Maxon Becomes Executive Director, Taylor Joins Leadership as Research Director Biddle Remains on NCAP Team as Co-Founder and Executive Director Emerita

10/9/2018

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BOSTON, Oct. 9, 2018 – The National Center on Adoption and Permanency announced today that Allison Davis Maxon is being elevated to the position of Executive Director; she succeeds Carol Biddle, who will remain an active member of NCAP as Co-Founder and Executive Director Emerita. At the same time, Joyce Taylor, PhD, is joining our leadership team as Research and Evaluation Director.
​

The changes, which are effective immediately, are being made for two primary reasons.

First, after a distinguished career as CEO of the Kinship Center in California and then as a leader of NCAP, Biddle decided that “it’s time for me to work a bit less – but just a bit, mind you.” She added that “promoting Allison from COO to Executive Director frankly was a no-brainer.”

At the same time, the organization is planning to put a greater emphasis on research and therefore is filling out its leadership team with a Research and Evaluation Director to demonstrate that commitment. Taylor, a highly regarded scholar at Springfield (MA) College and Yale University with a strong background in child welfare, has been chosen to fill that position.

“We’re delighted by these changes and believe they will both enable us to grow organizationally and fulfill our mission in increasingly significant ways,” said NCAP President Adam Pertman. “We’re in the enviable position of gaining from the remarkable skills that Allison and Joyce bring to steering NCAP into the future, while keeping Carol – and her wisdom – on board.”

Drawing on his experience heading the Donaldson Adoption Institute from 2002-2014, Pertman plans to work with Taylor and NCAP’s Senior Research Fellows to build NCAP’s research component. Under his leadership, DAI became the pre-eminent research, policy and advocacy organization in its field, contributing to better adoption and permanency practices and, most importantly, to improved outcomes for children and families. DAI closed its doors in January 2018, citing a lack of funding.

“This is an amazing opportunity for us and, most of all, for NCAP,” Maxon and Taylor said in a joint statement. “We’re very proud of what the organization has accomplished to date, of course, but we’re even more excited about what’s to come.”

For more information about NCAP, go to www.ncap-us. If you have questions or want to ask about NCAP assisting your organization, call 617-332-8944 or write to apertman@ncap-us.org. To congratulate Allison or Joyce, their addresses are amaxon@ncap-us.org and jtaylor@ncap-us.org.
​

www.ncap-us.org Massachusetts | California | Illinois | Washington, D.C. 617-332-8944


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Separating families at border is child abuse, plain and simple.

6/25/2018

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This article appeared on the Baltimore Sun on June 15, 2018.  To read the full article, click here.

"Deliberately separating children from their families, as the 
Trump administration is doing in the name of stemming illegal immigration, may indeed turn out to be a “tough deterrent,” as White House Chief of Staff John Kelly has described it. After all, the premise underlying this approach, however unnerving it may be, seems intuitively sound; that is, few parents would knowingly risk losing their sons or daughters if they could avoid doing so.

Adam Pertman contribution

“It is institutional child abuse and therefore traumatic by definition. So, no matter what its other consequences, it will almost certainly cause long-term harm to its youngest victims.”

To read the full article, click here



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Ethiopia Adoption Ban May Curb Trafficking, But Poorest Families Need Support

1/15/2018

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This article appeared on Voice of America on January 15, 2018.

Excerpt:

NAIROBI — 
A ban on the adoption of Ethiopian children by foreigners could curb child abuse and trafficking, but more support is needed for vulnerable families within the impoverished country, experts said on Monday.
Ethiopia is one of the biggest source countries for international adoptions by U.S. nationals, with about 20 percent of all adopted children coming from the east African nation, according to the U.S. State Department.

Adam Pertman contribution
"The most important thing is for the children involved to have permanency, in families," said Adam Pertman, president of the U.S.-based National Center on Adoption and Permanency and author of "Adoption Nation."
"The first choice is within their own family of origin, their own community and their own country," he added.

To read the full article click here

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As opioid crisis strains foster care, states aren’t tracking the damage

1/8/2018

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This article appeared on Reveal: From the Center of Investigative Reporting on January 8, 2018.
Excerpt
New Hampshire social workers are all too familiar with how opioid abuse can push children into foster care. They see it all the time.
The chain of events is often the same: After being approached by social workers, addicted parents continue to overdose or start dodging them. State officials deem the home unsafe and seek a court’s permission to remove the children.
Then comes a knock at the family’s door.
It’s a last resort, reflecting what appears to be a stark trend across the state: Since 2010, the number of child removals in which substance abuse was a factor has nearly quadrupled. The number of children entering out-of-home care has nearly doubled. And between 2012 and 2016, the number of children born drug exposed tripled.

Excerpt of interview with Adam Pertman

“What we do know anecdotally is that some number are directly linked,” said Adam Pertman, founder of the National Center on Adoption and Permanency. “Because the worker sees the parent, the worker sees the circumstances and can identify the direct link. But for every one they can identify as a direct link, there’s an unknowable number that we can safely assume occur.”

Click here to read full article

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Adoption Trauma by Allison Davis Maxon, LMFT

9/11/2017

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This article is written by NCAP's COO, Allison Davis Maxon, LMFT and was featured in the September 2017 issue of Fostering Families Today.

Article Excerpt
Let’s be clear . . . for the infant, child or teen, adoption is a traumatic experience. The trauma of forever losing one’s maternal and paternal family tree, lineage, cultural identity, genetic mirroring, relationships, siblings and other connections will be experienced and felt throughout the entirety of the child’s life. These losses to the child are traumatic, overwhelming and will linger across the entire life span. Through every stage of development, as the child’s understanding of adoption grows, the well of loss and pain deepens.

Click here to download and read entire article

About Allison Maxon, LMFT
Allison is a clinician, educator, and advocate specializing in adoption/permanency, attachment, and trauma. She is passionate about creating systems of care that are permanency-competent and strength-based. She has expertise in the fields of child welfare and mental health and is currently the chief operating officer of the National Center on Adoption and Permanency. Allison is co-author and master trainer of ACT: An Adoption and Permanency Curriculum for Child Welfare and Mental Health Professionals, co-author and master trainer of Pathways to Permanence: Parenting the Child of Loss and Trauma, and creator of The Ten Things Your Child Needs Everyday, a DVD with tools that help parents/caregivers strengthen their attachment relationship with their child. You can reach Allison at amaxon@ncap-us.org or 949- 939-9016.

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NCAP Outreach Letter Focuses on How Our People, Services Aim to Create a `Success Model’ for All Children and Families

5/11/2017

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Dear Colleague: I am writing today to tell you about a relatively new nonprofit organization that you may not know much about yet, though you may well recognize the names of our team members and Senior Research Fellows, as they include some of the most-accomplished thought leaders, researchers, trainers, speakers, educators, organizational and communications specialists, and policy experts in the field of child welfare. Together, we have formed the National Center on Adoption and Permanency (NCAP) because we believe deeply that the time has come to make fundamental, systemic, long-term changes to benefit the children and families we all serve – and we truly believe that, together, we can make that goal a reality.

To read the full announcement, click here.
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 Helping Your Child Move from Anti-Social to Pro-Social Behaviors

3/22/2017

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This article is written by NCAP's COO, Allison Davis Maxon, LMFT and was featured in the North American Council on Adoptable Children's Winter 2017 Adoptalk newsletter:

Allison is a clinician, educator, and advocate specializing in adoption/permanency, attachment, and trauma. She is passionate about creating systems of care that are permanency-competent and strength-based. She has expertise in the fields of child welfare and mental health and is currently the chief operating officer of the National Center on Adoption and Permanency. Allison is co-author and master trainer of ACT: An Adoption and Permanency Curriculum for Child Welfare and Mental Health Professionals, co-author and master trainer of Pathways to Permanence: Parenting the Child of Loss and Trauma, and creator of The Ten Things Your Child Needs Everyday, a DVD with tools that help parents/caregivers strengthen their attachment relationship with their child. You can reach Allison at amaxon@ncap-us.org or 949- 939-9016.

Article Excerpt
We all enter the world ready to attach because this is how we get our most basic and primary needs met. The human infant, like other high functioning mammals, is completely dependent on their primary caregivers to get all of their needs met—survival, safety, food, shelter, stimulation, comfort. For us to understand where some of our children’s most challenging behaviors come from, we must first realize just how much neglect and trauma affect every aspect of a child’s development. We are social-emotional beings with an innate need to connect and form meaningful attachment relationships. Every inter-personal skill required for us to be successful in creating and sustaining these relationships must be learned.

To read entire article, click here and go to page 8.

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Concord adoption agency closure causes widespread anxiety, confusion across the US

2/13/2017

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This article appeared on February 13, 2017 in the East Bay Times.  To read full article, click here.

Excerpt:
Pertman said IAC’s failure is “ a big red flag” that Americans should rethink their approach to private adoptions, an experience sometimes fraught with uncertainty, hope and heartbreak for prospective parents and expectant mothers alike.
“What is this process? Who does it serve and how do we do this better so if dire circumstances do occur people are not automatically hurt?” he said.

Click here to read full article
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Adoption agency collapse leaves trail of anguish, raises questions about oversight

2/10/2017

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This article appeared on February 10, 2017 in the Tampa Bay Times. To read full article, click here.

Excerpt:
"The reality is that adoption can be a lengthy and expensive long shot.
Only about 14,000 infants are adopted within the United States each year, way short of the number of couples and single people looking to become parents, said Adam Pertman, president of the National Center on Adoption and Permanency."

To read full article, click here.
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Adam Pertman, President and Co-Founder
apertman@ncap-us.org
617-903-0554
​

Allison Davis Maxon, Executive Director
amaxon@ncap-us.org
949-939-9016

Joyce Taylor, Research and Evaluation Director
jtaylor@ncap-us.org
​
508-404-0321

Carol Biddle
Co-Founder and Executive Director Emerita
cbiddle@ncap-us.org
​831-601-6842


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