American children spend an average of three and a half years in foster care after they become eligible for adoption.

• Of the more than 500,000 children living in foster care, 129,000 cannot return to their families and are waiting to be adopted. Among these children:
  • Males outnumber females.
  • African American children are disproportionately represented.
  • Nearly two-thirds are age six or older.
• The average length of stay in foster care for children awaiting adoption is 44 months.
  • More than 41 percent spend two to five years in foster care.
  • Nearly 20 percent are trapped in foster care for five years or more.
• Ages of children in foster care:
  • 0-3 — 25 percent
  • 4-8 — 27 percent
  • 9-12 — 21 percent
  • 13-15 — 18 percent
  • 16+ — 8 percent
• Prospective adoptive families have not been identified for approximately 80 percent of children waiting to be adopted.

• Only 17 percent of the children who left foster care in 2006 were adopted. More than 25,000 children “aged out” — turned out from the child welfare system not because they were reunited with their families or adopted, but simply because they turned 18. Research has shown that teens aging out of the system are highly likely as adults to experience homelessness, poor health, unemployment, incarceration, and other poor outcomes.

Learn More

• Learn about the role of child welfare systems in finding children permanent homes.
• Find out how Children’s Rights confronts issues related to adoption through our child welfare reform campaigns and policy advocacy.