Coram's Head of Adoption Awarded OBE
05 January 2010 The Head of Adoption for children’s charity Coram, Jeanne Kaniuk, has been awarded an OBE in the New Year Honours list for her services to children.
Jeanne Kaniuk has devoted her working life to adoption at Coram and the promotion of good practice throughout the adoption community. When Jeanne started at Coram in 1980 there were only three adoption social workers. Three decades later Jeanne has developed the service into one of the largest voluntary agencies in the country with teams in London, the East Midlands and East Anglia , finding loving families for 80 children a year. Today, Coram’s adoption service has one of the highest success rates in the country and a significant factor is the lifetime support provided to families.
Jeanne Kaniuk says:
“It has been an immense privilege to work with the many families who have come forward over the years to adopt children. The adopters have come from a very wide range of backgrounds, and we have all learned a great deal from these resourceful and dedicated families about what children need from us as adults if they are to heal the pain and overcome the impact of their early traumatic experiences. “
A recent innovation is the partnership between Coram and The London Borough of Harrow Social Services, the first such partnership of a voluntary adoption agency with a local authority. This is the first time adoption services have been provided in this way in the UK and has greatly reduced the time children wait for adoption and the age at which they find loving homes.
Jeanne has always sought to identify areas where children’s needs are not being met by statutory services. In 1995 she became aware of the placement needs of children whose families are affected by HIV. Jeanne negotiated funding and set up a project to plan for children bereaved and affected by HIV. Substitute families were identified in the African community to care for children and enable them to keep in touch with wider family members. Jeanne and colleagues created a culturally sensitive and flexible model requiring delicate negotiation with local authorities including housing departments to support these substitute families.
Jeanne also liaised with the Courts, Local Authorities and solicitors to create London’s first Concurrent Planning team in 1999. Babies are placed with specialist foster carers while their future is being decided. Babies who cannot return to their birth parents are adopted by their foster carers, thus avoiding unnecessary moves.
Jeanne was the first in the adoption field to recognise the importance of Attachment Theory. She was the instigator of a major longitudinal research study exploring how older adopted children, who have experienced neglect and abuse in their birth families, establish attachments with their new parents. This ongoing joint work with the Anna Freud Centre and Great Ormond Street Hospital for Children demonstrates how children’s internalised expectations of parental figures shift and change in a positive way throughout the first turbulent years in their new families.
Jeanne’s knowledge and understanding of adoption is highly regarded by colleagues and she is regularly consulted by professional groups and Government. She has contributed significantly to the understanding of how to assess the strengths and vulnerabilities of prospective adopters and how unresolved earlier losses impact on parenting capacity. This knowledge has been disseminated by conferences and publications. She has contributed to over 20 research publications on subjects such as attachment, support of families with HIV, adoption support and caring for maltreated children. Jeanne’s deep commitment to the wellbeing of children and support of adoptive parents has given hundreds of children from troubled and neglected backgrounds the chance of a stable family life.
David Holmes, Chief Executive, British Association for Adoption and Fostering says:
I am delighted to see Jeanne honoured in this way as she has made such a significant personal contribution to the development of best practice in adoption. Jeanne has also shown real commitment and generosity in her efforts to share that best practice with everyone working in adoption.
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For further media information, please contact Roberta Goldstein on 020 7520 0346 or email Roberta@coram.org.uk
