An hourlong feature on Houston’s public radio station last week put a spotlight on the ways that DePelchin serves children and families through foster care and adoption.

Arnold Valdez, DePelchin’s Vice President for Foster Care and Residential Services, was a featured guest on Townsquare, an afternoon radio show and podcast on Houston Public Media hosted by Ernie Manouse. The conversation explained the process of becoming a foster parent and how fostering is often a prelude to adoption. Guests, including family law and adoption attorney Rodney Jones, also emphasized the importance of working with an established, reputable agency such as DePelchin, which has been in operation for 130 years.

Valdez explained how DePelchin staff work to find the right home for each child, and that most adoptions come through foster care or kinship care, which is a type of foster care in which a relative cares for the child.

“No matter how you’re adopting, the process needs to be about the child and less about you,” he said. “It can’t be about getting the family’s needs met. It’s got to be about meeting the needs of the child, and in that process, the family’s needs will be met.”

The show also touched on the fact that there are not currently enough foster homes in Texas for children who need them, and that older children and sibling groups tend to stay in foster care for longer periods of time. Valdez emphasized that DePelchin works with a variety of families — single adults and couples — to find the right home for children.

“We have all different kinds of families,” he said.

The audio of the hourlong interview is available here.

For more information about becoming a foster or adoptive parent through DePelchin, including details about upcoming informational orientations, please visit this page.

Hundreds of children are heading back to school with the supplies they need thanks to the generosity of DePelchin donors.

Throughout the summer, DePelchin donors, staff, and volunteers have worked to fill 900 new backpacks with school supplies such as paper, binders, and pencils and pens. Volunteers have spent many hours at the DePelchin Donation Station in Houston sorting supplies and stuffing backpacks to ensure they are ready for school, which is beginning this month across Texas.  The backpacks are being distributed to children involved with foster care and other DePelchin programs in Houston, San Antonio, Austin, and Lubbock. DePelchin provides the backpacks in order to help students start the year successfully and as a way to support families providing foster care.

The Back-to-School Drive is a DePelchin tradition that recognizes the importance of supporting children and youth not only by connecting them with loving foster families, but also by helping to meet their academic and other needs. The organization also provides school-based, no-cost individual counseling to students in elementary, middle and high schools on 20 campuses and in four school districts throughout Greater Houston and Baytown.

These services are designed to address the social and emotional needs of children and teenagers who may be facing trauma, anger, depression, grief, anxiety, family conflict, or social struggles. If requested by a school, clinicians can also work with students in groups to address issues such as self-esteem, grief, and anger management.

DePelchin is profoundly grateful to all of the donors and volunteers who have made it possible for us to equip so many students with backpacks to start the year. We will continue to support these students and their families in order to help them succeed in school — and well beyond.