Mission
Northeast Ohio Adoption Services provides adoption and foster care services to teens and school-age children in the child welfare system by recruiting, preparing, and supporting specialized families.
Vision
Northeast Ohio Adoption Services will be recognized as the pre-eminent adoption resource for children, families, and Ohio's child welfare agencies. We envision the day when there is a life-long family for every child.
Core Values
At Northeast Ohio Adoption Services, we thrive on challenge. We expect high performance. We operate with a sense of urgency because children cannot wait and families should not have to.
Back to TopBoard of Directors
Chairmandennis b. lewis jr.
lewis development
Vice Chairman
julie a. vugrinovich
howard hanna real estate
Secretary
sherry l. sharon
first place bank
Member
deryck deMar toles
inspiring minds
Member
kimberly m. griffin
real living volpini group
Member
Anna Marie Jones
Member
j. bryan redmond, CFP
ameriprise financial
Member
Audrey Schinkel
Member
matthew g. vansuch
harrington, hoppe & mitchell
Member
joseph m. verostko
j. m. verostko, inc.
Member
Beth Ward
Hill Barth & King, LLC
Member
Susan Weller-Simpson
Emeritus Trustee
geraldine a. weller
Emeritus Trustee
john zimomra
butler wick trust co.
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Staff
cindy dealExecutive Director
cdeal@noas.com
(800) 686-6627 ext. 111
ryan pallas
IT Specialist
rpallas@noas.com
(800) 686-6627 ext. 104
john hostetler
Director of Quality Assurance
jhostetler@noas.com
(800) 686-6627 ext. 123
nancy ewing
Office Manager
newing@noas.com
(800) 686-6627 ext. 102
maxine brown
Receptionist
mbrown@noas.com
(800) 686-6627 ext. 106
melanie jones
Permanency Planning Specialist
mjones@noas.com
(800) 686-6627 ext. 125
judy mcCartney
Director of Communication
jmccartney@noas.com
(800) 686-6627 ext. 122
cary sanders
Permanency Planning Specialist
csanders@noas.com
gail seekins
Program Assistant
gseekins@noas.com
(800) 686-6627 ext. 128
kim stewart
Director of Permanency Planning
kstewart@noas.com
(800) 686-6627 ext. 107
bonnie carroll
Permanency Planning Specialist
bcarroll@noas.com
tim williams
Wendy's Wonderful Kids Recruiter
twilliams@noas.com
(800) 686-6627 ext. 139
georgia wilthew
Bookkeeper
gwilthew@noas.com
(800) 686-6627 ext. 117
Casey McKee
Executive Assistant
cmckee@noas.com
(800) 686-6627 ext. 110
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History
Northeast Ohio Adoption Services (NOAS) is a private, not-for-profit 501(c)(3) agency incorporated in 1978 for the purpose of developing and supporting lifelong adoptive families for children with special needs. The children NOAS serves are school-age, brothers and sisters, and/or children with physical, developmental, and/or emotional challenges. Removed from birth families by court action, many of the children have experienced severe abuse and/or neglect, endured multiple placements—in foster homes, group home care, or residential facilities.
The product of a three year, federally funded (1975-1978) Adoption Project for Handicapped Children, NOAS, emerged as an independent, specialized adoption agency in 1978 with a staff of four and a budget of $80,000. Currently, with offices in Warren and Chagrin Falls, Northeast Ohio Adoption Services is licensed by the Ohio Department of Job and Family Services to participate in the placement of children for adoption or in foster care (both treatment and family level care). Parent education, advocacy, and professional training are additional services provided by NOAS.
In 1984, the Hine Memorial Fund of the Youngstown Foundation funded a NOAS program to develop adoptive families for children with developmental disabilities who most often spend their childhoods in institutions because of their perceived “unadoptability”.
In 1986, NOAS developed a community-based treatment level foster care program for children with emotional/behavioral challenges who might otherwise be placed in more restrictive and costly institutional placements.
Also in 1986, The Eileen Lewis Memorial Endowment Fund was established to insure the ongoing financial stability of the agency, and to perpetuate the philosophy of NOAS—that every child should have the opportunity to grow up in a family of his/her own. With the passing of NOAS founder, Barbara Lewis Roberts, in 1994, the Foundation’s name was changed to The Eileen Price Lewis, Barbara Lewis Roberts Foundation.
From 1989-1991, NOAS operated the Northeast Ohio Mental Health/Adoption Training Project in fifteen northeast Ohio counties to provide referral and a consultation network of mental health professionals able to provide services to children and families in relation to adoption issues.
The Mahoning Co. Family Preservation Council joined NOAS in 1989 to promote community and agency collaboration, coordination, and communication in order to strengthen services for families, and to decrease the need for placements of children outside their homes.
In 1991, with state funding, NOAS developed a program to teach independent living skills to teens growing up in the child welfare system. Ohio Families for Kids, funded by Kellogg (1992 to 1999), provide answering/referral services to prospective adoptive parents for nine counties in northeast Ohio.
NOAS operated “The Partners: A Post-Legal Adoption Services Project” from 1990-1992. Developed using a mental health model, the program offered continuum of services such as case management, family preservation, family life education, support groups, respite, medical and financial consultation.
The Northeast Ohio Minority Recruitment Project (1991-1993) was designed to increase adoptive placements of minority children, to reduce barriers to adoption for minority families, to operate a regional minority adoption exchange, and to provide cultural sensitivity/competence training to child welfare staff.
The Permanency Planning Project (1992-1996) was designed to build upon the collaborative relationship between and among Summit County Children Services Board, Northeast Ohio Adoption Services, and providers of residential treatment in this region. Goals of the program were reunification with families of origin, placement with adoptive families, and development of other long-range family-type connections.
The Northeast Ohio Adoptive Parent Leadership Circle Project (1993-1995), in collaboration with Summit County Children Services, this project offered leadership development to adoptive parents, provided support to adoptive parent support groups, and built a network of adoptive family support groups.
The Respite and Recreation Project (1995-1998), in collaboration with Kent State University’s School of Exercise, Leisure, and Sport, NOAS provided respite to meet the special needs of each child and thereby increase the stability of adoptive families through therapeutic recreation programming.
Families for Teens (1995-1999), another collaborative project with Summit County Children Services and Portage County Department of Human Services, coordinated the efforts of counties in Northeast Ohio to advocate for the rights of older teens to be adopted.
Sisters and Brothers Together (1997-2000), in collaboration with the Cuyahoga County Department of Children and Family Services, developed and implemented an initiative to eliminate barriers and increase the number of siblings placed together in adoptive homes. An important outcome of this project was the placement of siblings and development of the Sibling Decision-Making Matrix. The Matrix is a step-by-step process that can be used by professionals in making sibling placement decisions. It has been adopted by Minnesota as the state standard for making sibling placements.
Targeted Community Outreach (2002-2006), by applying social marketing and community organizing theory/practice to the problem of too many waiting children, and by building community capacity to conduct targeted outreach efforts, NOAS demonstrated radically different approach for recruiting new families. Long term outcomes include: a strengthened sense of community support for waiting children and adoptive families, an increase in the number of adoptive parents, an increase in the number of adoptions, and a decrease in the time children wait.
Rural Targeted Community Outreach (RTCO) (2003 - 2008), a federal demonstration funded an opportunity for NOAS to implement the innovative social marketing/community organizing concepts developed in TCO grant in rural of Ohio. The approach to recruiting adoptive families is rather unique in the child welfare system. Portage, Columbiana, Licking and Knox Counties were pilot sites for RTCO.
NOAS enjoys a leadership role in the state in the field of foster care adoption because of its constant commitment to services that are high in quality, innovative in design and sensitive to the positive qualities of each child and every potential family resource. NOAS offers a full continuum of services to children and families, including child assessment, child-specific media recruitment campaigns, comprehensive education for preparation of families, post-placement, and post-legalization services.
NOAS does not charge fees to adoptive families. Services to families are funded through contracts with public children services agencies, fees for services, grants, donations, and fund raising.
Various volunteer opportunities occur throughout the year. Special fund raising events include an annual golf outing, spring flower sale, progressive dinner, and the Dave Thomas Celebrity Cookoff. Every year NOAS volunteers operate the Christmas Angel Tree project that coordinates the goodwill of many individual and corporate donors to provide Christmas gifts for more than 400 foster/adopted/waiting children throughout northeast Ohio.
In 2007, Northeast Ohio Adoption Services became a Wendy’s Wonderful Kids (WWK) program. A signature program of the Dave Thomas Foundation for Adoption, WWK funds a NOAS recruiter to develop/recruit adoptive families for specific waiting children. Being involved with Wendy’s Wonderful Kids has allowed NOAS to network with adoption agencies from all parts of North America.
Northeast Ohio Adoption Services has long been an innovator in special needs adoption. Since the agency’s inception, a number of federal demonstration grants in the areas of permanency planning for children, post-adoption family support, and respite and recreation for adoptive families have been developed and implemented. These projects focus on much needed services to children and families.
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