[Congressional Record Volume 148, Number 127 (Wednesday, October 2, 2002)]
[Senate]
[Page S9841]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                         ADDITIONAL STATEMENTS

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               MAINE'S ANGEL IN ADOPTION, DAWN DEGENHARDT

 Ms. COLLINS. Mr. President, each year, members of the 
Congressional Coalition on Adoption nominate an individual or couple to 
receive the ``Angels in Adoption'' award. This year, it was my pleasure 
to nominate Dawn C. Degenhardt of Houlton, ME to receive the 2002 
``Angels in Adoption'' award for her efforts and dedication to this 
cause. Dawn's wonderful story is truly inspirational.
  Born in Portland, ME, Dawn was a child advocate in Cleveland, OH, 
where she founded the State chapter of the Council on Adoptable 
Children. Dawn and another parent also founded Spaulding of Beechbrook 
in Ohio, which helps to place special needs children and is still in 
existence today.
  When Dawn and her husband decided to start their own family, they 
began by adopting two infants. By the time their second child was a 
year old, Dawn and Ed pursued an older child adoption. Over the next 
two years, they worked to encourage more people to adopt older 
children. They adopted four more children, one from a Native American 
adoption program in South Dakota and three from Vietnam. They then 
moved to Maine and adopted three more older children, two through the 
Maine Department of Human Services and one from India. Dawn and Ed 
adopted nine children in total.
  Though their own family was now complete, in 1977, Dawn's concern for 
the children still waiting in the foster care system prompted her to 
found the Maine Adoption Placement Service, MAPS, in Houlton, ME. Her 
original mission was to place special needs children and to educate and 
train their new adoptive families in a supportive environment. After 
ten years, the program expanded its services to include a housing 
component for pregnant teens and young women.
  Today, there are MAPS offices and programs with housing for pregnant 
and parenting teens in Portland, Bangor, and Houlton. The program also 
has licensed offices in Boston, Tampa, FL, and Silverthorne, CO. The 
Colorado office has also a therapeutic foster care program.
  The agency dawn founded is also licensed in Vermont, and has recently 
received accreditation by the Council on Accreditation of Children and 
Family Services, COA. MAPS was the first adoption agency to propose 
placement of children living in orphanages in the former Soviet Union, 
and that work continues to this day.
  The program is also functioning in Cambodia, where it offers a strong 
program of adoption services and humanitarian aid. MAPS also has 
developed programs in Kazakhstan, Romania, India, Guatemala, Sierra 
Leone, and Ecuador; offering families more international choices while 
never losing sight of its original mission of placing special needs 
children from the foster care system. Dawn continues to serve as CEO of 
the Maine Adoption Placement Service. This year she and her staff 
celebrate their twenty-fifth anniversary of bringing children and 
families together. Dawn and her team of dedicated professionals have 
helped to place over 3,500 children in loving homes.
  Dawm and Ed Degenhardt have built a family not only for themselves 
but also for many others. Their home has been filled with love and 
happiness. I am proud to know that Maine is home to a couple so full of 
compassion and generosity, and who have inspired countless more 
families, to show the same compassion and caring for children in our 
state and around the globe.

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