Mission 

Amara partners with birth, foster, and adoptive parents to create and support stable, loving homes for vulnerable children.

History 

Amara was founded in 1921 as Medina Baby Home, a traditional orphanage.  As research showed children developed best with individual care, Amara began placing children in private homes, a precursor to foster care.  In the 1940s as the number of children in foster care increased, Amara developed programs to find homes for older children, sibling groups, and minority children.  Amara was one of the first agencies in the country to coordinate trans-racial, single parent, and gay and lesbian adoptions.  We focus and pride ourselves on programs providing the highest levels of care and support:

- Adoption of children from the foster care system and at-risk infants relinquished directly to Amara.

- Foster Care in partnership with the State of Washington.  We monitor and support foster homes for children in transition who need the stability and safety of a healthy home until they return to their birth family.

- Pregnancy Counseling for women in crisis who need compassionate and nonjudgmental support from our counseling team to make difficult decisions.

Amara’s mission is grounded in the fundamental conviction that there is no substitute for strong families to ensure children grow up to be healthy, capable adults.  We believe that a safe, nurturing home is essential for a child to thrive and have developed our programs to serve the children most in need of stability. We are proud to offer our services to everyone, regardless of marital status, religious beliefs, sexual orientation, age, home ownership, income, or education.

Vision

Inspired by our new strategic plan, Amara is embarking on a bold quest to accomplish our vision—A Home for Every Child.  Through this detailed plan, we intend to:

- By 2010, place twice as many foster children in adoptive homes as in 2007

- Focus on harder to place children—sibling groups, older children, and children of color

- Take an active role in launching a community-wide movement for positive change in the way the community perceives and cares for children in foster care

To affect the change necessary to mitigate the statewide foster care crisis, we will create and implement a compelling communications plan to challenge misconceptions and help make children in foster care a community concern and priority.  We will play a proactive role to gather a community coalition of all agencies serving foster children—including the State—to work together to improve the quality of foster care in Washington.  

Visit Get Involved to learn more about how you can help Amara find loving homes for foster children in our community.