Discusses three specific best practice methods — training and technical assistance, child welfare monitoring, and new funding opportunities — to recruit foster and adoptive parents who reflect the race and ethnicity of children in foster care. Two training and technical assistance (T&TA) programs show great promise: the AdoptUsKids and the National Child Welfare Resource Center on Adoption (NRC). AdoptUsKids, a Latino-focused program, maintains online photo listings of children in foster care, offers recruitment and retention materials, provides a Spanish-language website explaining the adoption process, and increases awareness through publicity channels. Databases with demographic information tailor marketing/recruitment messages and allow Recruitment Response teams to assist states and Native American tribes identify and enroll the best foster families. The NRC helps states increase the cultural competence of child welfare professionals and encourages minority leadership through the Minority Adoption Leadership Development Institute (MALDI). The child welfare monitoring program recruits in neighborhoods which match the diversity of children in foster care; establishes a diversity council; assists prospective foster parents through the paperwork to become licensed; creates neighborhood-based child care centers; recruits at ethnic and heritage festivals and through radio and television stations; partners with African-American churches; and builds Hispanic adoption support networks. To increase funding to support recruitment, The Children’s Bureau expanded Adoption Opportunities (AO) grants to help recruitment programs in Colorado, Texas, North Carolina, and Virginia.
