Home > How Many Children Were Adopted in 2000 and 2001? > How Many Children Were Adopted in 2000 and 2001?: 1. Findings: Children Adopted

How Many Children Were Adopted in 2000 and 2001?
Numbers and Trends

Author(s):  Child Welfare Information Gateway

Year Published:  2004

Email Order (Free)  Print  (PDF 321 KB)  Share

Rate This    2.0/5, 2 Reviews

previous

You are in section: Table of Contents Acknowledgements Highlights 1 - Findings: Children Adopted 2 - Findings: Data Sources 3 - Methodology 4 - Conclusion References Appendix A: Total Adoptions… Appendix B: Public Agency… Appendix C: Adoption and…

next

1. Findings: Children Adopted

1.1 Total Adoptions

The total number of adoptions remained relatively constant from 1987 to 2001. As is shown in Exhibit 2, the total number for selected years has ranged from a low of 118,138 in 1990 (Flango & Flango, 1995) to a high of 127,630 in 2000. The number of adoptions in each State for each year is shown in the table in Appendix A.

Exhibits 3 and 4 show the number of adoptions in each State for the years 2000 and 2001. Exhibit 3 shows a total of 127,630 adoptions in 2000, and Exhibit 4 shows a total of 127,407 adoptions in 2001. Such small changes could easily be attributed to variations in the method of reporting.

Exhibit 2
Total Adoptions

D

*Estimates.

*Estimates

The numbers of adoptions shown in Exhibits 3 and 4 were reported by three possible sources:

• Courts
• Bureaus of vital records
• Special studies.

The final column, Total, shows the data from the "best" source. Where data were reported by multiple sources for a State, the project team selected the most reliable source according to the following hierarchy (from best to worst): special study, court, and bureau of vital records.

Adoption figures from special studies were the best sources of information in North Dakota (North Dakota Department of Human Services, 2003) and Virginia (L. Lewis, Virginia Department of Social Services, personal communication, June 27, 2003). A study in Iowa (C. Carey, Iowa Department of Human Services, personal communication, 2004) produced adoption figures for 2001 only, and these were used as the best estimate of adoptions in 2000. Total adoption figures for California were derived from a similar special study for 2001 (California Department of Social Services, 2003).

The State total was obtained from AFCARS in only two situations: (1) California in 2000 reported more adoptions in AFCARS than were reported in a special study, so the AFCARS figure is used in Exhibit 3, and (2) North Carolina included in its AFCARS reports not only public agency adoptions but also private agency and birth parent adoptions,¹ so its AFCARS report is probably the most reliable source of total adoptions for that State.²

The total number of adoptions in each State is related to the population size of the State, as is shown in Exhibit 5. States are arranged in order of population as reported in the 2000 census; California is at the top of the chart, and Wyoming is at the bottom. As shown in Exhibit 5, in some States, the number of adoptions is higher or lower than might be expected based upon the State's population size. For example, New York, Michigan, Maryland, Colorado, Oregon, and Kansas seem to have more adoptions, and States like Texas and Pennsylvania fewer adoptions, than would be expected if adoptions were correlated to population size alone. The factors that contribute to these exceptions need further exploration.

Exhibit 5

D

1.2 Adoptions by Source

Public Agency Adoptions

The median, or middle case, was 33 percent in 2000 and 32 percent in 2001. This percentage is much higher than the median of 16 percent found in National Center for State Courts studies conducted in the late 1980s and early 1990s (Flango & Flango, 1995). In Illinois, Oklahoma, Iowa, and Arizona, in both 2000 and 2001, the public agency adoptions comprised the largest share of all adoptions. More than half of all adoptions in these States were public agency adoptions. Of all States, Alabama and Wyoming had the smallest percentage of public agency adoptions. Exhibit 8 presents the percentages of total adoptions that were public agency adoptions for selected years between 1987 and 2001.

Exhibit 6

D

Exhibit 7

D

Exhibit 8

D

Intercountry Adoptions

There are two sources for information on intercountry adoptions. The State Department's Office of Children's Issues reports the number of immigrant visas issued to orphans to enter the United States. In 2000, the State Department issued 17,718 visas; in 2001, 19,237 visas were issued (U.S. Department of State, n.d.).

The other source of information is the Office of Immigration Statistics within the Department of Homeland Security, which reports on how many orphans actually enter the United States. In 2000, 18,120 orphans entered the country, while the figure for 2001 was 19,087 (Office of Immigration Statistics, n.d.).⁵

The Office of Immigration Statistics also reports information on the State of residence of all immigrant orphan children. Exhibit 9 shows that intercountry adoptions roughly follow the domestic pattern, in that States with larger populations have more adoptions than States with smaller populations. Some States, such as New York, Minnesota, and Connecticut, do have a larger percentage of intercountry adoptions than population size alone would predict.

Exhibit 9

D

Private Agency, Kinship, and Tribal Adoptions

No single data source reports any of these types of data. The total number can be approximated by subtracting the number of adoptions reported by AFCARS and the State Department and Office of Immigration Statistics from the total NCSC verifies from courts. The result is an approximation, but any difference due to gaps and overlap is probably only slight.

¹ "Birth parent adoptions" refer to those arranged independently directly between birth parents and adoptive parents without agency involvement. back
² Only 11 birth parent adoptions were reported in 2001, however, so birth parent adoptions for the year 2000 were used to estimate the total adoptions in North Carolina in 2001. back
³ This number includes private agency, independent, and tribal adoptions with public agency involvement that were reported to AFCARS. back
⁴ Adoption information in AFCARS is updated continually based on new reports submitted by the States. The data in this report were those available on May 15, 2003. back
⁵ These figures differ slightly from the State Department numbers, because some children may receive visas but not enter the United States in the same year. back

previous

You are in section: Table of Contents Acknowledgements Highlights 1 - Findings: Children Adopted 2 - Findings: Data Sources 3 - Methodology 4 - Conclusion References Appendix A: Total Adoptions… Appendix B: Public Agency… Appendix C: Adoption and…

next

This material may be freely reproduced and distributed. However, when doing so, please credit Child Welfare Information Gateway.

Email Order (Free)  Print  (PDF 321 KB)  Share

Updated on October 9, 2009