I want to adopt but I’m not sure where to begin.
“Where do I start?” is one of the most common questions for people starting their adoption journey, closely followed by, “Who do I work with?”
This blog post will hopefully explain the differences between the two agencies you can choose from and help you decide between them.
What’s the difference between a Voluntary Adoption Agency and a Regional Adoption Agency?
In your local area there are likely to be two types of adoption agencies to choose from.
- Voluntary Adoption Agencies (VAAs) like Yorkshire Adoption Agency
- Regional Adoption Agencies (RAAs) Local Authorities in the same region combined.
RAAs are collaboratives of local authority adoption teams from the same region and VAAs are independent, not for profit organisations covering local and sometimes regional areas.
Both VAAs and RAAs follow government regulations in – preparing, training, and assessing prospective adopters to the point of approval at Adoption Panel – and most importantly matching them with children who need lifelong, loving homes.
However, VAAs and RAAs also have different strengths and benefits. Deciding on an agency therefore depends on weighing these up and thinking about what you value most.
The main strengths that RAAs can offer include:
Local Authorities have children in their care – until the Adoption Order is granted, RAAs are responsible for the care of the children who have a plan for adoption, in their area. Once prospective adopters are approved with an RAA, they will start looking at matching an adopter’s criteria with the needs of the children they are responsible for.
You might hear that this means RAAs can match adopters with children quickly, but this is not always the case. Waiting times depend on lots of other factors too, for example,
- Where in the country you live
- Is the RAA in a partnership with VAA’s in your area?
- Which children you are open to adopting
- The plan for the children in care.
Some VAAs like YAA, publish average times it takes for adopters to be matched with children on their website, which can help adopters in their decision making.
Matching younger children without siblings. – Depending on the plan for a child, RAAs tend to look among their own adopters first when seeking to match the children in their care, so if you have definite preferences to adopt a baby or toddler, it’s worth considering this. However, changes in adoption mean that there are fewer babies with a plan for adoption than there used to be, so nothing can be guaranteed.
In relation to very young children, there is a route to adopt called Early Permanence. This means an adopter becomes a temporary foster carer for a young child whilst the plan for their care is determined. The plan could be adoption, meaning that you would then be able to adopt the child, or the plan may be that the child moves to live with a relative of the child’s birth parents. This route is available whether you choose to work with an RAA or a VAA.
The main strengths that VAAs can offer are:
A family feel – Collective feedback from adopter’s across VAA’s state that this is one of the reasons adopters choose to work with a VAA. The smaller size of VAAs means that adopters can form close relationships with the wider team and agency – not just their supervising social worker. Relationships are at the heart of how VAAs work, and they really get to know local communities making them inclusive and diverse agencies to work with.
VAA’s are more likely to place children with adopters from a diverse range of backgrounds. 1 in 5 VAA adoptions are to LGBTQ+ adopters and 13% of VAA adoptions are to adopters from an ethnic minority.
All the latest Ofsted inspections for VAAs have been Outstanding or Good, and relationships are at the heart of this. RAAs are not currently inspected although adoption is looked at within the broader inspections of children’s social care services. You can look at Ofsted reports here.
Lifelong support – VAAs know that support is crucial for adoptive families and needs to be available to access at any time, until a child turns 18 is this necessarily true? and without long waiting lists! VAAs tend to be specialised in adoption support so can be responsive, increasing the chance to speak to a real person when contacted and provide help that is tailored to what families need, whenever they need it.
National family finding – matching adopters with children from across the UK – VAAs work in partnership with all regions of the country to help find homes for children. This can be especially helpful for those hoping to adopt a child with certain characteristics, such as a child who shares the same ethnicity and cultural heritage.
Robust training – VAAs are experts in finding homes for brothers and sisters, children from diverse backgrounds and children who may need extra support in some way – which is why they tend to provide in depth parenting training sometimes including additional sessions about subjects such as Early Permanence. They want to ensure you are a successful parent, confident in supporting your child and your new family.
Feel free to ask RAA’s and VAA’s about the differences between them while you are making your decisions. They are there to help and the most important thing is that adopters can make properly informed choices about the agency they go with, by weighing up what is most important to them.
This blog was written in collaboration with the CVAA.
If this blog has raised any more questions, you can contact our friendly team for more information.
Find out more about the YAA family here