The adoption matching process is one of the most exciting, yet emotionally demanding, stages of your journey towards building a family. It’s a thoughtful and carefully considered process designed to identify the best possible parent or family to meet a specific child’s lifelong needs.
Because of this, the adoption matching process is a journey that calls for patience, openness, and a strong focus on what will help a child thrive not just now, but throughout their life.
At its heart, the adoption matching process in the UK is when adoption agencies and local authorities work together to find a family that can truly meet a child’s emotional, physical and developmental needs.
Social workers will carefully assess for emotional compatibility, the ability to provide therapeutic parenting, and how well a family can support a child’s identity, including their culture, background, connection with birth family and lived experiences.
Once approved as prospective adopters, the family-finding process begins. Your social worker and the family finding team will actively look for a child whose needs you are well placed to meet, based on your strengths, experience, and circumstances.
This stage of the adoption process can include:
Agency searches: Local authorities and regional adoption agencies (RAAs) often start by looking within their own pool of approved adopters before widening the search across the UK.
Link Maker: This is a safe and secure online platform where adopters can create a profile that can be made available to social workers across the UK. You can also view children’s profiles and work with your agency to identify possible matches.
Activity days: These are carefully planned, fun, informal events to provide opportunities for prospective adopters to meet children or speak with social workers about the children waiting for adoption.
When a potential match is identified, you’ll receive detailed information to help you understand the child’s needs and background.
This includes the Child’s Permanence Report (CPR), a key document in the adoption matching process, outlining birth parents’ history when known, the child’s history, health, emotional and developmental needs which helps inform understanding of the support they may require.
Before a formal match is considered, prospective adopters will take part in a linking meeting with their social worker, the child’s social worker and family finder. This provides an opportunity to explore the child’s background in detail, ask questions, and consider whether they feel able to meet the child’s needs before deciding whether to progress.
You will also meet key professionals in the child’s life such as foster carers, teachers, and health professionals. Sometimes it’s possible to take part in informal “bump-into” meetings to observe the child in a relaxed environment.
This stage is an important step in making sure you are informed and feel confident before moving forward.
As you discuss matching with a specific child, the local authority or adoption agency will prepare an Adoption Placement Report (APR) and draft Adoption Support Plan (ASP) to reflect the child’s identified needs and your family’s support requirements.
If everyone feels positive, the proposed match is presented to an adoption matching panel.
This panel, made up of professionals across health, education, and social care, reviews whether the match meets the child’s needs and supports a stable future. They will ask questions to explore how you plan to parent the child and manage any future challenges.
The draft Adoption Support Plan (ASP) will also be finalised and included in the paperwork submitted to the adoption panel when they review and recommend the proposed match (adopters will review, agree upon, and sign off on the finalised ASP before the child officially moves into their home).
Following the panel’s recommendation, the final decision to whether to approve the match or not is made by the Agency Decision Maker (ADM). A key step in the adoption panel process.
And if approved, introductions can begin!
You’re now moving into the next step of building your family. Each thoughtful stage of the matching process brings you closer to what matters most: a safe, loving, and permanent home for a child.
Remember that CATCH is on hand for every stage of the adoption journey, offering guidance on children’s needs, therapeutic parenting, the importance of self-care, and support through those early days of parenthood.
Discover more about the benefits of CATCH today.