Our mission

The Adoption Council of Canada (ACC) is Canada's voice for adoption, unifying communities' commitment to permanency for waiting children and youth. We support and encourage people along their adoption journey, connecting them to the families and resources they need.

In addition, the Adoption Council of Canada: 

• believes that adoption is a process that should meet the needs of children and youth 
• knows that every child has the right to a permanent, safe, nurturing family
• promotes ethical approaches by all parties involved in recruiting families 
• is committed to promoting ethical adoption practice for all adoptions, domestic and international.

The need for the Canada's Waiting Children Program

Although there are many families who would like to adopt healthy infants, the majority of the children and youth in care of our provinces and territories are not infants. Most are aged 12 and older. There is a great need for people - be they single parents or couples - to adopt or become permanent legal guardians for all the children and youth in foster and group care. Canada's Waiting Children is an attempt to bridge this gap in expectation and knowledge by introducing the people who come to this website to photos and descriptions of the many wonderful, exceptional and loving children and youth of all ages who are waiting for a family they can call their own forever. Many of the children and youth in care have experienced trauma, grief and loss. Some have visible or invisible disabilities. All of them need the support, love, safety, advocacy and help that families provide.

Traditional recruitment methods have not been successful in finding permanent families for the thousands of children and youth in care across Canada. The ACC believes that active, creative efforts - like this national photolisting service - are required to recruit families who will meet the needs of each of the children and youth listed on this website. 

Why use a website?

Experience with adoption recruitment programs over the last 40 years in Canada and the United States has shown that child-specific recruitment, rather than general recruitment or public education, is the most effective way to find the right family for a child or youth in care. Child-specific recruitment highlights actual children, and using our web-based photolisting service engages interested families. People are drawn to pictures and to personal descriptions. Photo-listing works - it helps to make matches between prospective families and waiting children.

Who are Canada's Waiting Children?

The children waiting for adoption in Canada range in age from less than a year to teenagers. Most of the children and youth referred to the Canada’s Waiting Children program are 3 years and older. Many of these children and youth have had life experiences, including trauma and loss, that may have affected their physical, emotional, or intellectual growth. Some have brothers or sisters who need to be placed with them.

These are resilient, exceptional and wonderful children and youth who have a great deal to offer any family. Some have had prenatal exposure to drugs and alcohol. Some have visible or invisible disabilities. All will enrich your lives - and challenge you. We hope these pictures and profiles will help you to begin to get to know a child, a youth, or a group of siblings who will belong in your family. 

CWC Process Guidelines

• The Adoption Council of Canada is an information and referral service. We are not an adoption agency.
• We use pseudonyms for the children and youth participating in this website. 
• We do not provide any information that would disclose a child or youth's geographic or agency location, unless the child welfare authority referring someone indicates that the child or youth can only be placed within a particular province/territory.
• We do not provide any information about foster or birth families on this website. 
• The Canada's Waiting Children program database contains only the information shown on the screen; pseudonym, reference number, month and year of birth and brief profile describing the child. The main database from which this information is drawn does not contain identifying information. It is not accessible from the Internet. 
• The ACC refers any expression of interest that an individual or a family makes to the child, youth, or sibling group's adoption worker for follow up. 

Agency process

• The agencies or governments referring children and youth to the Canada's Waiting Children program are committed to protecting the confidentiality of the children and youth in their care, while explaining the children and youths' needs accurately to prospective adopting families. 
• The governments or agencies provide accurate information to the Canada's Waiting Children program, but ensure that they do not use any confidential information in describing the children/youth for purposes of public recruitment.
• An adoption/permanency worker works with each child/youth to ensure they are ready for placement and knows that adoption, legal guardianship or other forms of permanency is part of the plan for their future. When possible, we as that children over six help to create their own profiles and give permission for their information to appear on the site. 
• The adoption/permanency worker and foster parents explain the Canada's Waiting Children process to the children and youth they are listing on the website. They make sure those children and youth know this photolisting is being used to help find families for themselves and others.
• The adoption/permanency worker respects a child or youth's wishes about information they do not want publicly disclosed. The social workers for the child or youth can provide any such information to prospective adoptive families in subsequent confidential discussions.
• The agency ensures that throughout the pre-placement, placement and post-placement period, there is an adoption worker and co-operative caregiver (foster parent or guardian) available to assist the child, children or youth with any services required to prepare them for participating in this program.