Today’s guest blogger is Morgan Larson.
Kemp, S. P. & Bodonyi, J. M. (2002).Beyond Termination: Length of Stay and Predictors of Permanency for Legally Free Children. Child Welfare, 81(1), 58-86.
Description of the article: Kemp and Bodonyi (2002) studied the length of stay and predictors of permanency within a study of 1366 legally free children in Washington state. They were curious about how gender, race/ethnicity, and age play a role within the first placement and the possibility of being adopted or gaining guardianship for this sample. The results demonstrated that older children, males, and African American children were least likely to achieve permanency compared to their Caucasian peers. Kemp and Bodonyi (2002) also discovered that Asian American and Hispanic children experienced shorter timelines to achieve permanency than their Caucasian peers. Within the discussion, the authors also urged the importance of child welfare workers to find extended family and kinship permanency options for African American and American Indian children to respect their cultural views of family.
Strengths of the article: A strength of this article was that it talked about the importance of permanency but also addressed flaws in the process of termination of parental rights and the increased length of stay for children in out of home placement. For example, Kemp and Bodonyi (2002) reported that even though there are time constraints for children to go back to their parents, there is no guarantee of permanency upon termination of parental rights. Another strength of the article was that Kemp and Bodonyi (2002) were very critical in the discussion of the results that were found. For example, the results showed African American and American Indian children staying in out of home placement for longer lengths of stay but they were overrepresented with respect to the population of Washington state. The authors noted that the sampling method wasn’t to blame for the overrepresentation because across the United States, African American and American Indian children are disproportionately “legally free children” without permanency.
Limitations of the article: There weren’t very many limitations to this article but one limitation was that Kemp and Bodonyi (2002) reported that poverty leads to substance abuse and allegations of neglect but didn’t offer any more advice on how to address the problems that arise within families living in poverty. They explained the fact that neglect and parental substance abuse take longer to conquer than the time limits for permanency. African American and American Indian children are overrepresented within the legally free population because they also have the highest poverty rate in the United States (U.S. Dept of Commerce, Census Bureau & American Community Survey, 2012).
Promote/dispel any myths about permanency: This article dispelled the myth that adoptive homes are readily available and waiting for all children after the termination of parental rights because African American and American Indian children wait for median lengths of stays (56.6 and 54.1 months) compared to their Caucasian and Latino peers (49.1 and 38.5 months) (Kemp & Bodonyi, 2012). Even the shortest amount of time which is 37.6 months for Asian American children is more than three years. Waiting, three to five years, in foster care to attain permanency can be damaging to the attachment and relationship building ability of a child.
Link to the article:
- S. Department of Commerce, Census Bureau, American Community Survey. (2012). Children living in poverty. The Condition of Education, March 2nd, 2015. Retrieved from: http://nces.ed.gov/programs/coe/indicator_cce.asp.