Placing a Child for Adoption

If you are considering placing your child for adoption please contact an adoption worker at Native Child and Family Services of Toronto. A worker can be reached at 416-969-8510.

Prior to the adoption, the birth parent(s) may provide input about the kind of family they would like for their child.  The values, lifestyle, education, cultural heritage and other characteristics that are important to the birth parents are considered carefully when choosing the child's adoptive parents.
 
Recently there has been a move to create more openness between adopting families and birth families. The degree of openness a child needs, a birth parent wants, or an adopting family can accept, is carefully examined early in the adoption process. It could range from a photo and/or a letter to go with the child upon adoption, to visits between birth parents and children.
 
Native Child and Family Services of Toronto encourages birth parent(s), who are relinquishing a child for adoption, to be involved in the planning process to the extent that they wish.  Practices in adoption tend towards openness to the extent that information exchange is non-identifying and protects the identities of both the birth and adoptive parents.  Birth parents relinquishing a child for adoption may participate in any of the following ways in the selection of an adoptive family: 

• Through the expression of hopes and preferences for their child or particular qualities they would seek in an adoptive family.
  
• By meeting the prospective adoptive parents to exchange wishes for and feelings about the child.
  
• With the agreement of the birth parents and adoptive family, the Society may act as an intermediary for the annual exchange of non-identifying information such as letters.
  
• Through the provision of gifts, letters or mementoes for the child at the time of adoption placement.

When parents decide to relinquish their child for adoption, a consent for adoption must be signed. This consent cannot be given until the child is eight days old. If only one parent is available, to sign a consent for adoption, it is the practice of this agency to pursue a voluntary Crown Wardship order, to ensure a child is legally able to be placed for adoption. There is a 30 day appeal period, after a Crown Wardship order is made. Provided there is no appeal launched within 30 days the child is then free to be placed in an adoptive home. Birth parents can reduce unnecessary delays in adoption finalizations by providing a copy of the child’s birth certificate or birth registration. If the birth was never registered the agency will assist the birth parent in getting the birth registered. 
A child being placed for adoption who is seven years of age or older must also give written consent. Consent given by either the parent or child (if the child is seven years or older) may be withdrawn within 21 days after the consent is given.
When a child has been made a crown ward under the Child and Family Services Act, then a children's aid society is required by law to make all reasonable efforts to secure an adoption placement, if adoption planning is in the child's best interests.
A Crown Wardship order is made by the courts on determination that in the child's best interests he/she can no longer live with his/her birth parents, and that a better and less restrictive option (such as placing the child with relatives) is not available. Under Crown Wardship, the province accepts all rights and responsibilities for the child.
A Crown ward cannot be placed in an adoptive home until any outstanding access order made under child protection proceedings has been terminated by court order, the time permitted for appeal of the Crown Wardship order has fully expired and any appeal of that order has concluded with a decision that has left the order intact. In cases of Crown ward adoptions, written consent to the adoption is necessary from the children's aid society and the child to be adopted, if that child is seven years of age or

We have provided some frequently asked questions of birth families but please call Native Child and Family Services if you have other questions not listed below or on our Frequently Asked Questions page.

What am I entitled to know about the adoptive family?
 
Birth parents are entitled to non-identifying information about the adoptive family. Sometimes adoptions are much more "open" and an agreement may be made that pictures and letters would be exchanged over the years. And some families may agree to ongoing visits. But no names or addresses are exchanged without everyone's permission.
 
Can I see the child before the adoption?
 
You can meet with the child’s foster parents, social worker(s), and see the child before the child is placed with you for adoption. A visit with the child can only occur after you have been selected as the best match for the child.
 

Can I receive payment or a reward from a family I place my baby with?
 
No. It is a criminal offence to accept payment or a reward for an adoption placement.
 
Am I entitled to know when the adoption is completed?
 
Yes, this is your right. Tell your adoption worker that you would like to be informed when the adoption has been completed.
 
What if the birth father does not wish to be involved?
 
We cannot force the involvement of the birth father. We do make all efforts, however to involve both birth parents in planning for their child and in signing consent to the child's adoption. It is important to remember that both birth parents can provide vital information about the child that no one else would know. They are the key to providing accurate health and social history information for the child and it is in the child's best interest to have this information from both parents.