Part-Time Infant Placement Coordinator

  • Contract

Company Description

Families First is Georgia’s leading non-profit family service agency. We assist over 37,000 children, women and families each year, and we have been serving metro Atlanta for 122 years. Our mission is to ensure the success of children in jeopardy by empowering families.

 Everything our agency does is about strengthening families—all kinds of families with all kinds of needs. We foster strong communities by delivering empowering and sustainable solutions to children and families—solutions that improve child well-being and family self-sufficiency. Families First accomplishes this by focusing on three impact areas: 

  • Child & Youth Permanency – to ensure long-term stability and support, we provide adoption, foster care and residential group homes for children whose lives have been disrupted.
  • Family Sustainability & Empowerment – we work collaboratively with other organizations to provide self-sufficiency through housing and supportive services for chronically homeless families.Healthy
  • Families & Relationships – we offer training and affordable counseling solutions to equip parents and families with critical skills to build healthy and strong relationships.

Job Description

POSITION SUMMARY:
Families First is a full-service adoption Child Placing Agency (CPA) and will be expanding its’ Adoption program to provide Infant Placement Services (IPS).  The Infant Placement Services and program goals include offering flexible, affordable, fee options to perspective adoptive parents; successfully matching prospective parents to birthmothers; assisting with placing infants in a safe, stable, and supportive home; supporting the new families with post adoption services; providing and/or connecting birthparent(s) to counseling and other services.  

Families First is seeking to hire a 5-10 hour per week, part-time Infant Placement Coordinator to promote and market the service as well assist with coordinating infant placement services.  The Infant Placement Coordinator must be available to travel up to 20 miles per week (minimally), flexible and work as needed both during and outside of normal business hours.  The position is not well suited for someone with another full-time job or inflexible working hours who cannot respond immediately to birth parent(s) needs.  Must have a minimum of a Bachelor’s Degree preferably in Social Work or similar field of study and at least 2 years of adoption experience.  Candidate must have counseling abilities; strong communication skills, both verbal and written; organized; personable; reliable transportation; flexible and comfortable with agency as well as program promotion and marketing.   

PRINCIPAL ACCOUNTABILITIES:
•    Build relationships with pregnancy resource centers, hospital social workers, OBGYN offices, and other community organizations to recruit women in crisis pregnancies who are considering adoption.  Outreach also includes building and maintaining relationship with physicians at obstetrical and infertility clinics to inform them and patients of Families First adoption programs including the Infant Placement Services (IPS). 
•    Assist with planning and implementing of IPS informational seminars for service inquiries, which may occur in the evenings and weekends. This will include public speaking to present IPS to seminar attendees. 
•    Maintain documentation of outreach activities, marketing activities as well as document any activities, interactions, with the birthparent(s).
•    Be flexible to work with birth parents (as necessary) as well as flexibility with meeting community resources in order to conduct presentations, meetings, and other marketing activities, etc. 
•    Provide information and education to birthparent(s) who are considering adoption, especially information regarding the IPS.  
•    Conduct an initial assessment with the birthparent(s) to determine support services that are needed.
•    Present the birthparent(s) with Adoptive Parent Profiles and assist birthparent(s) with selecting a family.
•    Navigate applicable meetings with birth and adoptive parent(s) including mediating any ongoing contact between the birth and adoptive families.
•    Assist with facilitating the discharge of the baby from the hospital to the adoptive parents.
•    Offer follow-up services to the birthparents, including grief support, counseling services throughout the process and post-placement, contact with the adoptive family, as well as pictures and updates of the child. 
•    Collect and store documents in electronic record-keeping and paper filing systems as applicable.  
•    Compile, prepare and submit and program reports and/or data as needed.   
•    Assist with program development including writing IPS operational procedures and/or policies.  
•    Interpret as applicable Agency and Program policies to birth parents, community agencies, and referral sources. 
•    Stay current and educated on issues that relate to adoption, including child welfare, members of the triad, infertility transracial adoption, cultural heritage, and cultural diversity; bonding & attachment, loss & grief.
•    Stay knowledgeable about child development life cycles, and family dynamics, early child hood trauma, PTSD, prenatal drug and alcohol exposure and consequences including FASD.
•    Stay knowledgeable as well as attend applicable, ongoing as needed training regarding the laws and regulations as they relate to adoption in Georgia.
•    Maintain the standard of ethics for the adoption profession, licensing, accrediting bodies, federal, state and local laws. 
•    Quality Improvement – contribute as needed to achieving program goals and on-going program quality improvement by contributing to staff and community meetings and plans.
•    Other duties as assigned. 

COMPETENCIES:
•    Microsoft Office proficiency, especially Outlook and Word.
•    Strong writing and verbal communication including presentation skills. 
•    Excellent time management and organization skills.
•    Ability to work with minimal direction as well as when required collaboratively in a team setting.
•    Active listening and problem solving, judgment and analysis skills. 
•    Strength-based approach to service delivery and flexibility (e.g., trauma-informed approach to care).
•    Responds appropriately to cultural differences among the Agency’s service population.
•    Demonstrates creativity around marketing techniques and activities.
•    Empathetic, non-judgmental, persistent and creative human services professional.

 

Qualifications

MINIMUM QUALIFICATIONS:
•  Education - Bachelor’s degree in social work, counseling, psychology or a related field.
•  Experience – minimum of 2 years in the adoption human services field. 
• Travel - Ability and willingness to travel potentially over 20 miles per week.
•  Flexibility – able to adjust schedule as needed, including ability and willingness to work non-traditional hours, may require some evenings and weekends when needed.

Additional Information

 

WORKING CONDITIONS:

Normal well-lit confidential office environment where there is little to no physical discomfort due to temperature, dust, noise and the like. May be required to meet with staff throughout the facility and in remote offices.

EEO Statement:

It is the policy of Families First not to discriminate against any employee or applicant for employment because of race, color, religion, sex, national origin, age, marital status, genetic information, disability or because he or she is a protected veteran. It is also the policy of Families First to take affirmative action to employ and to advance in employment, all persons regardless of race, color, religion, sex, national origin, age, marital status, genetic information, disability or protected veteran status, and to base all employment decisions only on valid job requirements. This policy shall apply to all employment actions, including but not limited to recruitment, hiring, upgrading, promotion, transfer, demotion, layoff, recall, termination, rates of pay or other forms of compensation and selection for training, including apprenticeship, at all levels of employment.

 

Families First is an Equal Opportunity Employer dedicated to Affirmative Action and Workforce Diversity. 

 

Families First participates in E-Verify.