Why Do You Need a Home Study?
A home study is a process conducted to assess and prepare families for adoption. The home study includes a home visit by a qualified adoption professional who talks in-depth with the family and prepares a written report. At Adoption Options, we conduct home studies for families adopting through our own agency or through other agencies. We welcome traditional, single-parent, and LGBTQ families to Apply for a Home Study
A home study is required in almost all adoptions, including public agency, private agency, international, and independent adoptions. The home study also helps adoptive parents understand and prepare for the adoption process.
What Does a Home Study Involve?
At Adoptions Options, the home study process includes several meetings with a licensed clinician, both at the agency and at the prospective family’s home. It is a time for you to explore adoptive family life, including the continuum of openness in adoption, the experiences of birth parents, issues of race and ethnicity, and any questions. you have about any aspect of adoption.
The home study process also includes gathering autobiographical and background information, letters of reference, employment verification, child abuse, and criminal clearances, medical history, income statements, and other relevant information. Once the process is completed, the clinician writes a document incorporating the information gathered into a formal home study.
Why Choose Adoption Options for Your Home Study?
Adoption Options offers a thorough process that will help you both qualify and prepare for this huge change:
- Our home studies are widely accepted. Because Adoption Options is a licensed adoption agency with a highly qualified staff, our home studies are widely recognized and accepted by other agencies. These include private, nonprofit, and state agencies as well as those in other countries. The home study document is valid for one year from the approval date and can be updated annually as needed.
- We’ll help you feel ready to adopt. Our caring and knowledgeable staff will take the time to work with you to explore your expectations, concerns, and decisions such as the type of adoption and degree of openness you would like to pursue. Families that have worked with Adoption Options have shared that the personal, thorough, and caring attention received from our staff helped them feel secure as they navigated the adoption process. We make a commitment to each of our families. Our staff is available from the first meeting, when we explain how adoption works, to the moment when a family joyfully welcomes their child home.
- We believe adoption is a lifelong process: We continue our commitment to our adoptive families through programs, meetings, and community building after your child comes home. Adoption Options is the only agency in Rhode Island that provides post-adoption resources specifically for families who have adopted through private agencies.