Arms Wide: Immerse

So who is our typical user?

Meet our users Caroline and Stefan, a married couple who have no kids and are interested in adopting from foster care after meeting Arms Wide at a recruiting event. They have been interested in adopting kids for a while and came across Arms Wide Adoption agency at a adoption care recruiting event in Houston. They attend the information meeting on a Wednesday evening after a long day at work and are inundated with information on the risks of adopting from foster care, the steps of the tedious process at Arms Wide, and the support they will be given throughout the process. They enter their information into a tracking system and are given a couple pamphlets outlining Arms Wide mission and the overall process. The meeting makes them feel overwhelmed and they begin to doubt whether or not they are ready for adoption from foster care. They also are new to the adoption from foster care community and do not know anyone at the meeting making it difficult to express their concerns. Sally and Bob head home, deciding to think about the opportunity for a while before taking further actions. They receive little to no follow up from the Arms Wide Adoption services and therefore never end up using their resources when the time is necessary. They are also never connected with parents who have gone through the adoption process with Arms Wide and are therefore unable to address their concerns.

 

Stefan and Caroline represent our typical user who is interested enough in Adoption from Arms Wide to attend an information session but does not follow through to the training phase because they become overwhelmed, feel a lack of support, and their concerns are not appropriately addressed. Our DFA project aims to tackle this issue by determining how we can retain parents interested in foster care process through all steps of the process. By talking with and interviewing our users, we hope to understand the key reasons parents drop out of the process in order to help us figure out potential solutions for Arms Wide.

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