Rita's Blog
Give
May 10, 2012
Guest post by Kate Bartalon
Senior Director, Development
Each year during the second week in May we see a surge in giving here at the Foundation. Something I expect is common for many nonprofits. In celebration of Mother’s Day, sons and daughters are making gifts in honor of and in memory of their moms. Perhaps it’s because so many of us were taught the value of giving from the person in our lives who gives us so much — our mothers.
I’m Kate, a fundraiser at the Dave Thomas Foundation for Adoption. For more than 15 years I have been asking people for money. 
Asking them to take a moment to consider what change they want to see in the world and to invest in and support the organizations that are making those changes.
For me, giving began when I was a young girl. My mother believed we all have something to give, regardless of the amount of money in our pockets. She taught me to drop coins into the basket at church, to take time to volunteer at the local soup kitchen, to simply sit with a stranger in need. Most importantly, she taught me to give of my time and money joyfully.
I have the honor of asking others to give of their time and treasure. I do this with the knowledge that when they say yes, they will forever impact the life of a child. They will ensure a mother is found for the children we serve. Imagine the joy in knowing your gift has that kind of power — that your gift will give the love of a parent to a child, that your gift will provide the safety of a home, that your gift will provide the security of a family.
Today, I’ll make a gift to the Foundation in memory of my mother, in celebration of the values she taught me, and in honor of the more than 100,000 children who still wait for loving families of their own. I encourage you to take a moment, to think of what is important to you, to call the organization in your community that is making the change you want to see in the world, and to make a gift. And once you make that gift, call a friend and ask them to do the same.
Click here to give to the Dave Thomas Foundation for Adoption.
When did we stop caring about children?
April 19, 2012
There is a staggering amount of chatter hitting each of us from all sides – social media, network news, community forums, Super PAC advertising – about how to improve the economy, guide policy, elect someone from the “home team.” But to a child, the talk must seem like a prolonged playground brawl with bullies. There is no end to the scuffle until someone wins, and that inevitably means the loser walks away with a black eye.
What is the message to our children who watch us brawl (um, debate) in Nebraska for example, and within the same political party, whether illegal immigrants should be offered the humanity of prenatal care? And in states like Missouri, where a poor economy is driving more children into the state’s foster care system and whether lawmakers should cut nearly $13.6 million from the foster care budget and eliminate dozens of child protection jobs? And in Georgia, where police took a kindergarten child away from school in handcuffs in a patrol car during an uncontrolled tantrum, and whether that is good practice for handling 6-year-old children. If you follow me on Twitter, you’ll know that these are just a few of the many examples of how we are failing our youth. When did we stop caring about children?
In this year of elections and winning, we simply must drive a conversation that puts children and families first on the agenda and with information that is always drawn back to – what is best for children, particularly those most vulnerable – homeless, hungry, under-educated or abused. How can we assure a safe and thriving community that demands each child has a viable future in this country, no matter where or under what circumstances they are born? How can we insist that we raise our children, all children, in an environment of hope, rather than despair? What needs to happen to make this a nation that cherishes childhood?
Ask your local, state or national candidate, from school board to presidential, “When elected, what you will do for children?” And then ask them to be specific about programs and services that they will support with passion, commitment and cash. And keep asking. The more we ask, the better chance there is that the children watching us this year will believe that we do actually care about them.
Dave Thomas Foundation for Adoption and Wendy’s: Doing good together
April 9, 2012
Although we say his name dozens of times every day, there is an entire population young adults who may have never heard of Dave Thomas. Not only was he the founder of Wendy’s, the iconic international hamburger chain, he also created the Dave Thomas Foundation for Adoption. Adopted as a child, Dave Thomas understood the dynamics of melded families, and was keenly sensitive to the challenges embedded in America’s foster care system and, notably, the children who must navigate government structures – frequently on their own. He emerged as a national adoption advocate in 1990, when President George Bush asked him to become a spokesperson for a new adoption initiative. Dave Thomas urged businesses to provide adoption benefits to employees, testified before Congress in support of adoption tax credits, appeared in public service announcements, led the effort to create the U.S. Postal Service’s Adoption Stamp, and in 1992 created the Dave Thomas Foundation for Adoption.
Clearly ahead of his time, he also put in place a unique nonprofit-corporate partnership that thrives today and focuses exclusively on dramatically increasing the adoptions of children from foster care. Cause marketing was not uniformly accepted as good for business 20 years ago; today it is a rare corporation that does not align with efforts impacting social change – from eradicating cancer to supporting families of critically ill children, from building homes for the displaced to assuring clean water for citizens of African nations. Research now shows that doing good is good for business, but in focusing on foster care adoption, Dave Thomas simply wanted to give back.
As a result, Wendy’s franchisees, their employees and their customers, The Wendy’s Company corporate staff, and suppliers associated with the business all work to generate significant funds for the national nonprofit public charity with the same commitment that resonated in Dave Thomas’ quote, “These children are not someone else’s responsibility. They are our responsibility.” The Dave Thomas Foundation for Adoption is equally committed to measurable results from the programs that have grown under this partnership, most notably, Wendy’s Wonderful Kids, a signature program of the Foundation.
Consider the child welfare landscape today. According to the most recent national estimates, last year nearly three million investigations of child maltreatment occurred in this country. As a result of those investigations, more than 700,000 cases of child abuse or neglect were substantiated by the professionals charged with assuring the safety and care of these very special children. Ultimately, after procedures defined by statute and jurisdictional protocol, last year alone, more than 255,000 children were placed in foster or temporary care to assure their safety and to assist the family. Sadly, for 107,000 individual children, more than 50 percent of whom are age 8 or older, the egregiousness of their abuse, neglect or abandonment demanded not only intensive court involvement and the resulting maze of systems and professionals, but also the permanent separation from their parents and home.
The balance of children entering the system remains uneven and the length of time in care is frequently too long. Last year, for example, 64,000 children in foster care were permanently removed from their families of birth, yet only 53,000 children were adopted. These same children waited in foster care an average of four-and-a-half years to be adopted and many wait even longer. A wait of four years, a lifetime to a child, is often further complicated by multiple placements in different homes, schools and neighborhoods and frequent separation from siblings. Childhood moves very quickly in four years.
Understanding the urgency of this dynamic, the Dave Thomas Foundation for Adoption designed and implemented Wendy’s Wonderful Kids in 2004 to increase adoptions from foster care, concentrating especially on children most likely linger in or age out of care – older youth, children with siblings who are also available for adoption, and children who are physically or emotionally challenged. With the fundraising partnership of Wendy’s, the program has grown from seven pilot sites to now 127 individually grant-funded positions in public and private agencies in all 50 states, D.C. and four provinces in Canada.
To date we have served more 7,700 children and have finalized the adoptions of nearly 3,000, with 543 more children in their pre-adoptive placements, simply waiting for the final court hearing. Significantly, of these children, 68% are age nine or older, 48% have at least one identified disability, 30% have had six or more placements at the time of referral, and 21% have had a failed or disrupted adoption prior to Wendy’s Wonderful Kids. Numbers alone, though, are insufficient to fully explain the success of the program.
Rigorous evaluation of adoption recruitment programs should be standard practice given the importance of the outcomes, yet until now, none has been evaluated using methods that yield rigorous evidence that they work differently than the status quo. In order to understand the effectiveness of the child-focused model, the Foundation commissioned Child Trends to conduct an unprecedented five-year research effort that presents the most rigorous empirical evaluation of foster care adoption recruitment practices completed to date. The results from a randomized control trial involving more than 20 of the Wendy’s Wonderful Kids sites show that children in the experimental group were substantially and significantly more likely to be adopted, with the greatest impact on older children and children with disabilities.
The partnership of the Dave Thomas Foundation for Adoption, Wendy’s and its customers and adoption agencies across the nation is making a measurable and substantial difference for children waiting to be adopted. Twenty years after starting the Foundation and 10 years after his passing, Dave Thomas has two equally important legacies – the business he created and the lives he changed through the Dave Thomas Foundation for Adoption.
Simple acts of kindness
April 2, 2012
Dave Thomas and Robin Campbell.
Guest post by Robin Campbell
Senior Director, Corporate Relations
His visible simplicity underscored what made him complex.
I worked for Mr. Thomas for the better part of 15 years at Wendy’s and witnessed countless moments of simple kindness: He always said good morning. He knew most of the 600+ employees by name. He loved to poke fun at his fellow executives. He cherished his family. He fiercely advocated for children.
Today, 10 years after his passing and celebrating the 20th anniversary of the Foundation bearing his name, as an employee of the Foundation I have the privilege of practicing what he lived. The Dave Thomas Foundation for Adoption is a small but mighty national nonprofit operating on the one sentence vision Dave bequeathed us: every child deserves a permanent home and loving family.
Once at a luncheon, I watched as the local politicians and celebrities competed for his attention. He was polite, but unfocused. His awareness was focused on a young man busing tables nearby. The youth – maybe 16 years old – was methodical in his job and unaware of the scrutiny. The table guests continued to talk, but Mr. Thomas excused himself and approached the young man. Putting his hand on his shoulder, I saw him speak to the boy, ask a couple of questions, pat him on the back and hand him a $100 bill.
Mr. Thomas championed the underdog. He saw himself in every young person in the restaurant business trying to do good job. A simple man? Yes. But profoundly influential in his example to just be nice.
A lesson I try to practice every day.
Robin Campbell is the senior director of corporate relations for the Dave Thomas Foundation for Adoption. For 16 years she worked alongside legendary Wendy’s executives like Dave Thomas, Gordon Teter and Jim Near. A team member of the Dave Thomas Foundation for Adoption since 2002, she works with the extensive Wendy’s system to help grow Wendy’s Wonderful Kids, a signature program of the Foundation. Learn more about Dave Thomas here.
Adoption Tax Credit: What next?
March 6, 2012
In 1996, the Small Business Job Protection Act provided the first “Adoption Assistance” tax credit for families who adopted. This tax credit was implemented to help offset the expenses families may have incurred while going through the process of adoption. Since full implementation in 1997, across political party lines and administrations and with significant ongoing Congressional support, the adoption tax credit has been increased, extended and renewed.
Curiously, the credit has not been made a permanent part of the tax code, but rather frequently has changed in amounts allowable (increasing form the original $6,000 to the current $13,600), income eligibility, refundability and documentation requirements. In other words, it takes a tax professional to assure that the right adoption tax credit filing occurs, and even then, too often an IRS audit is the result.
The Dave Thomas Foundation for Adoption, with the dedicated voice of Mr. Thomas, fought for the initial adoption tax credit in order to help ensure the adoption of children waiting to be adopted from foster care. In the past 14 years, the credit has been used by tens of thousands of families, not only those who adopt from foster care, but any family who adopts. Challenges to the tax credit have been well-documented, from accessibility to those families most in need — most frequently families adopting children with special needs from foster care — to the confusion for families resulting from the continually changing requirements.
And now, without legislation passing this year, the current tax credit is set to expire on December 31, 2012. If allowed to expire after tax year 2012, the credit will revert back to the maximum of $6,000 for adoptions of children with special needs and will eliminate the tax credit for all other adoptions.
If we consider the original intent of the tax credit as critical to supporting families who step up and provide a safe and permanent home for some of our most vulnerable and hurt children, then it is also important to contact your elected officials (senate.gov and house.gov) and ask that the tax credit be made permanent, refundable and flat for families who adopt children with special needs to help with their support, regardless of the expenses occurred in the adoption process. You can reach your senators and representative from this site: http://www.congressmerge.com/onlinedb/.
Mr. Thomas’ words still ring true – we need to make this permanent and simple for families “because it is the right thing to do.”
For more information:
Rita’s blog
For more than 25 years, Foundation president & CEO Rita Soronen has worked on behalf of abused, neglected and vulnerable children. Read along as her work continues.