Adoption-Competent Counseling

    A Multi-Module Training Curriculum

    Language, Identity, Grief, and Meaning-Making Across the Lifespan

    Developed by Renée M. Murphy, with co-researcher Angela Christianson and faculty advisor Dr. Jamie Bower.
    Antioch University New England, 2026.

    About the Curriculum

    Adoption is not a single event. It is a lifelong relational and meaning-making process that intersects with identity development, loss, belonging, and narrative reconstruction at every stage of life. Yet most counseling graduate programs dedicate little to no curriculum to adoption competency, leaving practitioners underprepared for the nuanced clinical presentations adoptees bring to the room.

    This curriculum provides foundational adoption competency training grounded in the Adoptee Lifespan Framework. It is not a primer on adoption law, placement logistics, or adoptive parent support. It is a clinician-facing framework for understanding and responding to the interior life of adoptees across the lifespan. Designed for licensed counselors, social workers, school counselors, and graduate trainees across settings.

    7Modules
    6CEU Hours
    5Theoretical Foundations
    1Framework

    Program Modules

    Seven modules. Modules 1–6 are each approximately 60 minutes of self-paced learning. Module 7 is a 30-minute theoretical module introducing the Adoptee Lifespan Framework.

    1

    Adoption Foundations

    2

    Adoptee Identity

    3

    Adoptee Grief

    4

    Language & Practice

    5

    Clinical Skills

    6

    Diverse Experiences

    7

    The Adoptee Lifespan Framework

    Learning Outcomes

    Upon completion of all seven modules, participants will be able to:

    1.Articulate how adoption functions as a lifespan developmental and relational process, not a discrete event.
    2.Identify the layered architecture of adoptee identity and recognize how disruptions at different developmental points present differently in clinical contexts.
    3.Recognize adoptee grief presentations that do not conform to conventional bereavement models.
    4.Audit and revise their clinical language for adoptee-competent communication.
    5.Apply foundational clinical strategies for pacing, assessment, and meaning-making work with adoptee clients.
    6.Demonstrate awareness of how race, culture, placement history, and disclosure dynamics shape adoptee experience.
    7.Engage critically with an emerging integrative theoretical framework and articulate its relationship to the published literature covered in the curriculum.

    Registration and Access Coming Soon

    This curriculum is currently under review. Registration and access details will be posted here when the program is available. If you are interested in early access or would like to be notified when the curriculum launches, get in touch.

    Contact Renée