2025 Recruiter of the Year: Tina from South Dakota
During the 2025 Wendy’s Wonderful Kids® Summit, the Dave Thomas Foundation for Adoption recognized Tina, a Wendy’s Wonderful Kids recruiter with the Children’s Home Society of South Dakota, as a Recruiter of the Year.
Through our Wendy’s Wonderful Kids program, the Foundation supports the hiring of adoption recruiters, like Tina, who are dedicated to finding permanent families for the longest-waiting children in foster care. That includes teenagers, children with special needs and siblings. These professionals use an evidence-based, child-focused recruitment model to find the right family for every child in their care. A rigorous, five-year national evaluation revealed that children referred to Wendy’s Wonderful Kids are up to 3x more likely to be adopted.
“Dedication, passion, empathy and unwavering commitment are a few words that perfectly describe Tina,” shared Megan, an Adoption Program Manager. “She puts in the work for the youth she serves through the Wendy’s Wonderful Kids program. Her tireless efforts help to build a support system for them.”
Tina has built strong relationships with custodial agencies in South Dakota, biological families, foster and adoptive parents and most importantly, the youth she works with every day. She consistently advocates to individuals and organizations in her community about the importance of the child-focused recruitment model and the difference it makes for children on her caseload.
“The thing that keeps me the most motivated to keep going are the youth. It’s the children themselves,” Tina shared. “I think about where they would be when they turn 18 if we haven’t found a family for them. I know that there’s a family out there, it’s just a matter of finding them, and we just have to push through and be tenacious to get there.”
Congratulations, Tina, for this special honor, and thank you for your commitment to finding safe, permanent families for the longest-waiting youth in foster care.