Rocking the Cradle: Ensuring the Rights of Parents with Disabilities and Their Children

"According to a 2012 report from the National Council on Disability, in custody cases, "removal rates where parents have a psychiatric disability have been found to be as high as

• 70 percent to 80 percent; where the parent has an intellectual disability, 
• 40 percent to 80 percent in families where the parental disability is physical, 
• 13 percent have reported discriminatory treatment in custody cases.

Parents who are deaf or blind report extremely high rates of child removal and loss of parental rights.

 Parents with disabilities are more likely to lose custody of their children after divorce, have more difficulty in accessing reproductive health care, and face significant barriers to adopting children."

Link to "Rocking the Cradle": http://www.ncd.gov/publications/2012/Sep272012/

Toolkit

Disabled Parents Toolkit (PDF)
Disabled Parents Toolkit (plain language version)(PDF)

Report

Rocking the Cradle: Ensuring the Rights of Parents with Disabilities and Their Children (PDF)

Table of Contents

• Chapter 1. Introduction
• Chapter 2: Research Methodology
• Chapter 3: Disability Law Framework
• Chapter 4: Pursuing Parenting Rights Through the Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities
• Chapter 5: The Child Welfare System: Removal, Reunification, and Termination
• Chapter 6: Parental Disability and Child Welfare in the Native American Community
• Chapter 7: The Family Law System: Custody and Visitation
• Chapter 8. Inappropriate and Unadapted Parenting Assessments in Child Welfare and Family Court
• Chapter 9: Lack of Adapted Services, Adapted Equipment, and Parenting Techniques in Child Welfare and Family Court
• Chapter 10: The Adoption Law System
• Chapter 11: Assisted Reproductive Technologies
• Chapter 12: The Impact of Disability on Parenting
• Chapter 13: Supporting Parents with Disabilities and Their Families in the Community
• Chapter 14: Promising Practices to Prevent Unnecessary Removal and Loss of Children
• Chapter 15: Remedial State and Federal Legislation of Interest
• Chapter 16: Need for Legislation to Ensure the Rights of Parents with Disabilities and Their Families
• Chapter 17: Findings and Recommendations
• List of Acronyms
• Acknowledgments
• Appendix A: Interviews
• Appendix B: State-By-State Analysis of Dependency Statutes and Their Inclusion of Disability
• Appendix C: Model Legislation (State or Federal)
• Appendix D: Proposed ADA Amendment
• Endnotes

Executive Summary

The goal of this report is to advance understanding and promote the rights of parents with disabilities and their children. The report provides a comprehensive review of the barriers and facilitators people with diverse disabilities—including intellectual and developmental, psychiatric, sensory, and physical disabilities—experience when exercising their fundamental right to create and maintain families, as well as persistent, systemic, and pervasive discrimination against parents with disabilities. The report analyzes how U.S. disability law and policy apply to parents with disabilities in the child welfare and family law systems, and the disparate treatment of parents with disabilities and their children. Examination of the impediments prospective parents with disabilities encounter when accessing assisted reproductive technologies or adopting provides further examples of the need for comprehensive protection of these rights.

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May you find Strength in Your Higher Power,GranPa Chuck

Researcher, Editor, Publisher, Collector