Since our family is going through the home study process ourselves right now, I thought I’d share exactly what’s going on, not just a theoretical version.
We received our application packet from the adoption agency that is doing the home study. It is full of paperwork to be filled out, releases to sign, and other information that we need to provide.
Here is what we have to fill out:
The adoption application itself – This asks for general information about residents of the household, contact information, education, income, and extended family.
Supplement to the application – This asks for additional information such as history of drug and alcohol abuse, medications taken, have you been through counseling or psychiatric care, have you ever been investigated for child abuse and/or neglect, and number of marriages.
Financial information worksheet – This sheet asks for very personal information that you may not feel is relevant or want to share, but we’ve had to fill one out every time we have done home study. It asks how much money you have in checking, savings, other investments such as 401(k), annuities, mutual funds, stocks or other investments. It also asks about your outstanding loan balances as well as balances on credit cards and other types of debts.
Request for police records check – This form gives consent for the agency to pull your police records and see any contact you have had with police. In our case, the record is quite long and we notify agencies of this up front. My husband is a volunteer firefighter and emergency medical technician. If he makes contact with the police at one of these calls, it is recorded on his history. This record will show all things like speeding tickets, disorderly conduct calls (which we’ve had with Sammy) and other things where you may have had police contact but not criminally charged.
Criminal history record request – This will be a more extensive request and will show any criminal activity. This includes arrests, even if you were not convicted. Be sure to tell your agency up front if anything will appear on here. It is better to be up front than to have the agency be surprised. You will have to submit a fingerprint as well. How each agency handles this varies. On our form we can do it from home. Other agencies will require you to do it in front of a witness or through their system.
Driver inquiry notice – This is a new form that we have not filled out before. It simply authorizes the agency to run our driving record.
Certification of identity – This form authorizes the U.S. Department of Justice to release my personal information to the agency. You will probably not have to fill one of these out. The agency that we are dealing with also does international adoptions where this would be applicable.
Child’s health report – This is in regards to any children currently in your home. The report must be filled out by a medical professional and indicate any medical conditions your child may have. This serves two purposes.
1) To be sure that your child is healthy and if there are any diseases the child may pass to another child in placement.
2) To determine if your child has extreme care needs that may make it difficult for you to care for another child.
Adoptive parents health report – This is similar to the child’s health report in that it must be filled out by a medical professional. The parents’ health report is more extensive than the child’s since you will be the caretaker. The medical professional is being asked to determine if there is any obvious reason that you would not be able to care for the child until the age of eighteen.
To be continued…. Click here for part 2.
Photo credit – Our paperwork