Coram IAC has received its fourth consecutive ‘Outstanding’ judgement by Ofsted for its services for children, young people and families.
The inspection rated Coram IAC as ‘Outstanding’ across all areas including overall experiences and progress of service users, how well children, young people and adults are helped and protected, and the effectiveness of leaders and managers.
Coram IAC is the UK’s only dedicated international adoption charity, and became part of the Coram Group in July 2023.
The Ofsted report says: “Staff are ambitious for children, working proactively with family finding resources to place children in an adoptive family when they may not have otherwise found a suitable or timely match. Children are thriving and making significant progress.
“Social workers keep the child at the forefront of their practice, skilfully advising and guiding adoptive parents to take every opportunity to help children progress in their learning and development. Vital learning from adopted adults with lived experience of intercountry and/or transracial adoption has informed preparation, training materials and adoption support activities for children and families.
“Adopters speak very highly of the service they receive. Knowledgeable and experienced social workers help enquirers make sense of complex eligibility rules and processes for various countries. Assessments of adopters are thorough and of an excellent quality, focusing on their ability to care for vulnerable children with complex needs. Adopters have referred to their social workers as ‘amazing’ and ‘fantastic’.”
Ofsted’s report also noted that “matching is very well considered” and that “adoptive parents described staff as making a ‘massive difference’ in helping children settle into their new families”.
Coram IAC’s adoption support service is described as a “beacon of good practice” with an “impressive range of resources for families”. One adopter said: “The support in the last year has been wonderful. My social worker has been unbelievably responsive and generous with her time and expertise.”
Irene Levine, Managing Director of Coram IAC, said: “Given the complexity of intercountry adoption work with the associated demand to make sense of complex eligibility rules and processes for various countries, it remains such an accomplishment to not only be acknowledged for this expertise but also for the trauma informed practice permeating the agency whilst being a beacon of good practice in the adoption support we deliver.
“We want to thank all the dedicated and diverse Coram IAC workforce who give their all to support families every day, to our trustees who have supported us through making some brave decisions over the last year to ensure the amazing service is secured into the future, and most of all our adoptive families who trust us through the challenges of parenting.”