My Nonprofit Reviews

As an adoptive parent of a child with Down syndrome, my path frequently crosses with Reece's Rainbow and the families they serve. Over the years there have been more and more disturbing stories coming out of this organization. It seems clear that at their Ukraine program (which I believe is the majority of their operation) functions primarily as a referral service for 1 primary adoption adoption facilitator in Ukraine, whose ethics are considered questionable by many adoptive families and other adoption professionals. I have heard story after story of families bullied, threatened, and intimidated by this man if they ask too many questions try to seek out other facilitators to assist in their adoptions. Although Reece's Rainbow has been made aware of the myriad issues surrounding this facilitator, they continue to unquestioningly refer adoptive families to him. Families choosing to use other adoption professionals to assist in their processes often encounter mysterious delays and often have difficulty receiving grant funds raised for the children they are adopting.

Additionally, donations are mailed to Maryland yet RR's accountant who processes all deposits is located in another state. Many, many donations have gone missing only to be found after a family inquires about them. One wonders how many donations were never credited to the appropriate child/adoptive family's grant fund because no one knew to ask about them.

Another major problem is that RR is essentially functioning as an adoption agency, but are not licensed and therefore are subject to none of the laws that regulate these agencies. The director, Andrea Roberts, frequently tells families that they may or may not be "matched" with a particular child, though she is not a social worker nor has she ever had a successful adoption that did not end in disruption. She has been known to ask for more or less information on various adoptive families before giving out grants for the children they are adopting. RR asks for information that no other adoption grant organization does, which is a great intrusion of adoptive families' privacy. In some cases, she has even required copies of adoptive families' homestudies, which contain a great deal of potentially sensitive and very private information.

Those who inquire about these various problems will find that all communication ceases and public attacks (via Facebook, etc) begin when the questions get difficult. I have yet to get straight answers to any of the "hard questions," in spite of Andrea Roberts' insistence that RR is completely open and honest and open to questions. When people start asking the questions, she stops responding to e-mails, blocks people on Facebook, and starts posting status updates about how persecuted she is by the agents of Satan.

In looking over the other reviews on this site, there are several bits of incorrect information- Andrea Roberts and several other staff members do take a salary, so this is not an "all-volunteer" organization.

I wholeheartedly agree with RR's mission. It is just unfortunate that somewhere things got horribly messed up. I cannot recommend this group to anyone and have serious concerns about their ethics.

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