History of HIC
Hawaii International Child (HIC) (founding name, Hawaii International Child Placement and Family Services, Inc.), was established in 1975 by members of Hawaii’s adoption community. HIC’s founding members came from a background of personal connection to international adoption. Some had parents who’d been adopted; others had adopted children themselves, or were raised with siblings who’d been adopted. In its early years, HIC worked directly with Holt Children’s Services International, bringing nearly 2,000 orphaned children from Korea to American families. In 1991 HIC moved from the Big Island of Hawaii, to Honolulu on the island of Oahu, to better serve a larger adoptive parent population. HIC has actively sought to maintain its reputation as a friendly and client-focused agency. Our staff is united in our love of children, our respect for adoptive parents, and our enjoyment of the important work we are lucky to be able to do.
Since 1975, HIC has helped more than 3,000 children find their forever families. We have run adoption programs in China, Russia, Azerbaijan, Kazakhstan, the Ukraine, Thailand, Vietnam and the Republic of Georgia. We have worked in cooperation with other agencies and parties, to place children from Cambodia, the Philippines, Peru, Guatemala, Mexico and Japan. We are a contract agency working with the State of Hawaii Department of Human Services to place children from foster care into permanent homes in Hawaii. We work with adoption attorneys in private adoptions and facilitate private domestic adoptions. We work to place children from mainland state foster programs into permanent homes in Hawaii.
As a 501(c)3 non-profit agency, HIC is governed by the HIC Board of Directors and is licensed by the State of Hawaii. HIC undergoes an annual audit performed by an independent certified public accounting firm (CPA) and has completed the highest standard of national non-profit recognition through the Council on Accreditation (COA). HIC has worked to maintain donation programs in many of the countries in which we work.
