If we are using technology to create the opportunity for couples to fall in love, could we do the same to change the story of a waiting child?
Those familiar with the adoption process will understand that last term but many don't. The reality is, we have about 30,000 children across the United States waiting for a family and they are called "a waiting child" by government agencies and case workers. What was a truly unexpected learning moment, was finding out there are waiting families. Sometimes a family hoping to adopt will wait for years and years. Why?
A national misinformation campaign buries the true needs for the children in foster care, those waiting children, and distorts the recruitment approaches deployed to attract families to foster-adoption.
Connecting with Family-Match, a program of Adoption-Share, Whitney led the implementation of the program in Virginia and its renewal of appropriations from the Virginia General Assembly. The goal? Use software to better match the goals of a waiting family with the goals of a waiting child to create a relationship that was built from a place of inspired variables, rather than one of exhaustion and burnout.
Through her strategies and determination, the enrollment exceeded the program first-year goal of 10 sites, with Whitney enrolling more than 128 sites and exceeding other goals by 500%.