Adoption101.com
T H E I N T E R N E T A D O P T I O N S C H O O L
INTERNATIONAL ADOPTION
(Copyright 2008, Adoption101.com)
International adoptions (also called intercountry adoptions) are those where the child is born outside the United States, but is adopted by adoptive parents living within the United States. Every adoptive parent has heard rumors of one country or another having children awaiting immediate adoption. Most recently this has been the Soviet nations, China and Guatemala for the largest number of adoptions, but they exist from other countries as well. Adoptive parents sometimes ask why they can't go to a more “pleasant” country, such as France or England, to adopt. There are several reasons, both practical and legal, why this is the case. All industrial nations all face the same problem as America - there are more couples waiting to adopt than there are children free for adoption. For that reason, when American adoptive parents travel overseas to their country of choice for their adoption, they are likely to meet other adoptive parents who have traveled there from Germany, Italy, France, England, Sweden, et cetera, who are there with the same goal. International adoption is not just popular with Americans. It is a global practice.
Most of the countries with children free for adoption are either third-world countries, or countries undergoing economic and/or social strife, leading to conditions where they can't offer enough homes for their children. Unlike America, where foster homes are used, most all foreign nations place children in orphanages until a home is found. In recent years, a handful of countries are finding the benefits to children when placed in a foster home, offering more nurturing contact. This is still quite rare in international adoption, and orphanages continue to be the norm, although the quality of the orphanages vary a great deal.- Dr. Barbara Bascom and Carole McKelvey explain the revitalization of international adoption in their book, THE COMPLETE GUIDE TO FOREIGN ADOPTION:
"International adoption had a turning point in 1990. After a steady decline that began in 1986 and continued through the cold war years, the numbers of children adopted from foreign countries suddenly reversed their downward trend and burst back into prominence when the plight of thousands of institutionalized children in former eastern bloc countries was exposed by the Western media. By the end of the year, the hollow faces and pleading eyes of these children had entered the living rooms - and hearts - of every Western family that had a television set. For more than one million American families on waiting lists of adoption agencies - many having been there for years - the media blitz became a living advertisement for intercountry adoption. The results were predictable. Thousands of Western families rushed to Eastern Europe to adopt its abandoned children. Returning airplanes were so full of adopted children and their new parents, they were dubbed 'the baby flights.' International adoption had begun its renaissance of the nineties."
Where Do the Children Come From?
How many children are being adopted via international adoption, and what countries do they come from? Presently, approximately 5,500 children were adopted by Americans from Europe (90% of these from Russia); about 8,000 from Asia (the majority from China, but a significant number from Korea) and several hundred from other countries in South and Central America as well as Africa.
For a complete country-by-country breakdown of each country's requirements, the type of children usually available, and typical cost, the book ADOPT INTERNATIONAL by O. Robin Sweet and Patty Bryan, is helpful with a 53 country review. The most up-to-date information about the country from which you are considering adopting will likely come from the international adoption program you select, as each countries practices and requirements can change month to month. Assuming you have found a well qualified international program, it will be your best source of current information.
There is also a very important legal reason why international adoptions are from troubled countries, such as those in Eastern Europe, and China, rather than countries the equivalent of America. The United States government will only issue a visa, allowing the adopted child to enter America, if the child is “orphaned.” This term in interpreted broadly, and includes not only children whose parents are deceased, but those who have been abandoned, relinquished, et cetera. These children, given orphan status by our government, are given special consideration in being granted an immediate visa to enter the United States, and to be given automatic U.S. citizenship. Children not meeting this distinction (such as in a voluntary adoption by the birth mother as is common in America, where she selects the adoptive parents) would not be eligible for this special status to enter our country.
International adoptions are potentially much more legally complex than domestic adoptions, but oddly, are sometimes completed more quickly, as quality international programs are expert in dealing with the technical aspects of the laws and procedures of the child’s country, the laws of the adoptive parents’ home state and the Unites States Citizen and Immigration Service (USCIS, previously called the INS - Immigration and Naturalization Service) . Once you are in the child's country (called being “in country”), this speed is seen in the fact you will generally complete an adoption in 10-45 days, about ten times faster than domestically. It is somewhat odd that a foreign country will grant an adoption in so short a time, when our own country cannot, or will not, do so. Regardless, it is the reality of international adoption. Of course, as will be seen below, there is much to do - and much time passing - before going to the child’s country for that “fast adoption.” Based upon the country from which you wish to adopt, and the speed of the international adoption program you select, it might take as little as five months before you can leave for the child’s country, or significantly longer (measured from the time you start the process with the program of your choice).
The procedures you must follow will be determined by many factors: the eligibility restrictions of the adoptive parents set by the adoption program you select, and those of the child's country of origin (age, marital status, etc.); the laws of the child's country governing adoption; the adoption laws of your home state governing international adoption; and the USCIS' requirements concerning the admission of the child into the United States and citizenship. If the preceding list of factors sounds complicated - that is because international adoption is complicated. That does not mean an international adoption cannot be done quickly and smoothly, because many can. In fact, when measuring complete start-to-finish time, many adoptive parents can actually adopt faster internationally than domestically. The potential complications, however, demonstrate the importance of working with a quality international adoption program with an excellent support staff overseas. Some tips to find the right program are offered in the pages below. Why do so many Americans prefer international adoption? In his book ADOPTION: The Essential Guide to Adopting Quickly and Safely, by adoption attorney Randall Hicks, many of the common reasons are provided:
- Some adoptive parents are not eligible for a domestic adoption, or fear long waits due to factors (age, marital status, etc.), which are not issues internationally.
- They wish to adopt a Caucasian child, which they fear (rightly or wrongly) may be difficult to adopt locally. (In Eastern Europe, virtually all children are Caucasian.) Alternatively, they may wish to adopt a child of a particular heritage, such as Chinese, and find few such children are placed for adoption within their home state, or in the United States overall.
- The adoptive parents may be of an ethnic group where there are few adoptive placements locally, yet they wish a child of their same ethnic group. In some cases, their native country may be one of those permitting international adoption.
- The adoptive parents feel they do not need, or in some cases even desire, a newborn (diaper changes and midnight feedings are not for every parent!), and like the idea of adopting a child who is a toddler or older. (Few newborns are available internationally, as usually at least six months to one year must elapse before the child is free for international adoption. Many countries, such as China, place most of their children when under 12 months. In other countries, age can range from one year olds, to toddlers, to older children. Sometimes, there are more adoptive parents waiting for the youngest children than there are children available, just as in the United States.
- They have humanitarian concerns for the children living overseas in orphanages who desperately need homes. This is more compelling for them than the domestic scenario, with many adoptive parents vying for the babies available. Some adoptive parents are not comfortable with the open nature of most domestic adoptions. They feel uncomfortable in working closely with a birth mother, and prefer working with a foreign government who has already severed parental rights, and will complete a closed adoption.
- There is fear that a birth parent will seek to reclaim the child under state law. They prefer to adopt a child who is already completely legally free. - There is concern that even if they are eligible for a domestic adoption, they may wait a long time for a birth mother to select them. They want a definite timetable to have a child in their home, which can be possible in international adoption, but not in domestic.
So, how do you start an international adoption? All international adoptions require an adoption agency home study by an agency licensed for international home studies. In that sense, every international adoption is an agency adoption. However, the home study requirement is only a very small part of what makes up a completed international adoption. The critical part is the completion of the adoption itself overseas. In most states, international adoption programs may be operated by either agencies or attorneys, or in some cases even facilitators. (A facilitator is a person or business who is not licensed as an agency or attorney, but operates an adoption business, usually employing a name which sounds like an adoption agency.0 They are not usually trained or licensed, as are agencies. If an agency or attorney makes serious mistakes, they can lose their license. A facilitator may keep on doing what they are doing - taking money from a public unaware of possible prior improprieties, as the facilitator generally has no license to lose. Adoption101.com advises all adoptive parents to only work with a licensed international adoption agency, or a skilled adoption attorney, starting with those admitted to the American Academy of Adoption Attorneys.
Most countries prefer to work with agencies, while some will work with attorneys. However, as will be explored later in this seminar, the quality, cost and speed of services can vary tremendously among different international programs. Luckily, it is not always hard to find an excellent program. There are also disadvantages to international adoption. Some adoptive parents describe their trip to the child's country to bring the child home as a nightmare. They complain they arrived in the foreign country only to find the child was not yet free for adoption, or that other adoptive parents were promised that child. The child's photos they were shown may have been a year old. There may be an inadequate program staff to assist them overseas in interacting with foreign officials and courts. This usually means the adoptive parents did not select the right agency. Such problems are quite rare with quality programs.
Health issues can also be a concern. Due to the lack of quality health care in some nations, some of the children brought home may have minor or major health problems. Some countries, like Romania many years ago, justifiably earned a bad reputation for the poor quality of most of their orphanages. Other countries, including eastern European countries like Russia, and China, have orphanages ranging from very good to poor. Again, the best programs tend to know how to find the best ones.
How to Avoid Problems in an International Adoption
To avoid these problems before they start, it is critical to do two things:
- Find the right international program; and
- Find the right country from which to adopt.
There is no shortage of good international agencies - and no shortage of poor ones! There are many good countries from which to adopt, and others to avoid. It is too complicated a matter to list here, as what is good for one adoptive parent is not necessarily good for another. Each person has different goals. Also, what might be a good country today, can become a bad country tomorrow, due to a change in laws or health care procedures. There is a fair amount of stability in the most popular countries, however, with major changes occurring every few years, often with advance notice.
Doing It Right: A Step-By-Step Approach
| The information is this article is up to date for the moment, but be aware that due to the United States' implementation of the Hague Treaty, some of the procedures will change. It is expected the Hague will become fully effective in late 2007. At that point, if you do an international adoption with another country which is also a Hague member nation (most are or will be), you can only work through an agency which is specially "accredited" by the U.S. government to do international adoptions. Attorneys or other adoption professionals must also be "approved." (Different terms - accreditation v. approval - are used due to their different status.) |
To fully understand why some international adoptions can go smoothly, while others become mired in complications, it is necessary to see how the entire international adoption process works. There are two methods to use in doing an international adoption. The USCIS, which oversees part of the process, jokingly calls one “the fast way” and the other “the other way.” Here is a step-by-step review of how the author of ADOPTION: The Essential Guide to Adopting Quickly and Safely, guides his own clients (a.k.a. “the fast way”), and which is reprinted in his book, a shortened version of which is provided below:
- The adoptive parent must obtain a pre-placement home study from a licensed adoption agency or specially approved social worker approved to perform international adoptions. This typically takes about one to three months, depending the state. The usual home study cost for this “pre-placement” evaluation usually varies from $500 to $2,900. Costs vary a great deal as each state has different requirements of what the home study must contain, and who is permitted to do it.
- Concurrent to starting the home study, the adoptive parents should file an USCIS form called the I-600-A (Application for Advance Processing of Orphan Petition). The purpose of the I-600-A application process is to receive the USCIS' approval for your international adoption, a required element in every international adoption. To obtain this form, and its instructions, for free, it can be downloaded at www.uscis.gov. Once at the USCIS home page, go to the Site Map (top right), then scroll down to "Immigration forms."
- The I-600-A form must be sent to a specially designated USCIS office serving the adoptive parents' home region (they are listed at the above USCIS website), along with their birth certificates or passports; marriage license (if a married couple) and divorce decrees, if any; and the USCIS' fee of $545. The adoptive parents will later be fingerprinted as well, for a small additional fee. It is wise to file the 1-600-A at the same time as starting your home study. This is because the USCIS does not require a copy of the home study when the I-600-A is filed, but it does require the home study before approving the I-600-A. Since it often takes the USCIS time to start your paperwork and process your fingerprints, why not use that three month period to complete the home study? You can accomplish both in that time period and move on quickly. (Typical USCIS processing time varies by location. Some issue their approval in only six weeks and others take four months.)
- Each foreign country requires a dossier of the adoptive parents. This is a compilation of all the documents required by the foreign nation. A typical dossier will contain 10-15 documents, such as the home study, USCIS approval form (the I-171-H) the adoptive parents’ marriage certificate (if a couple), letters verifying employment and good health, etc. All these documents must then be individually authenticated, based upon the foreign country's requirements. Usually this means the document is notarized or certified, then additionally verified by the state Secretary of State in which the notary or county clerk initially authenticated the document.
- Now the completed dossier, and the authentication stamps, must be translated into the language of the foreign country, then those translations are authenticated in some manner. Depending upon the requirements of the country from which you are adopting, the cost of the authentications and translations for a complete dossier will be from $1,400-$3,500. Depending upon the policies of the country from which you adopt, the dossier may be sent to the foreign country's officials for approval, or it may be hand-carried by the adoptive parents when they travel.
- Adoption programs in some countries will send you a photograph and health history of a child they believe matches your stated desires for a child (age, gender, existence of any special health conditions). The adoptive parents then travel to the child’s country to adopt that specific child. Some programs can offer multiple children concurrently, where a specific child is not pre-selected. The adoptive parents then choose the child when they are “in country.”
- Talk to your selected international program about which method various countries you are considering are using. In most cases, the child is pre-selected.
Although a small number of countries bring the child to you in the United States via an escort, so you never need to leave home, most countries require the adoptive parents to come to their country, meet the child, then finalize the adoption in the local court of the child’s country. Naturally, these nations want to be sure their children are being properly adopted under their own laws. A few countries will issue the equivalent of a guardianship, requiring the adoptive parents to finalize the adoption in their home state in America, under the supervision of a local agency.
A good international adoption program will have a skilled translator, as well as a car and driver at your disposal, to meet your needs in going to all the official places during your visit. It is this person who will translate for you with foreign officials, interpret health records, and accompany you to the many places you are required to go in completing the adoption (which you could never find alone): the orphanage to meet the child, the court to finalize the adoption, the birth certificate office and passport office to obtain the child's new records reflecting your adoption. When the adoption is finalized overseas, you are given a new birth certificate with the adoptive parents listed as biological parents, and with the child's new name, as selected by the adoptive parents. Before the child can enter America, a foreign doctor specifically approved by the U.S. government, called a panel physician, must conduct a basic examination of the child. The goal is to be sure the adoptive parents know everything that is possible to know about the child's health and that the child has no contagious diseases posing a risk to Americans. Again showing the varying quality of different country's orphanage systems, the U.S. government requires extensive testing for the children of some countries. With other countries, however, the U.S. government seems to have such confidence in the health system and records of the foreign orphanages that the examination is very cursory when the orphanage records were very detailed.
All of the above documents are presented to the American Embassy overseas, along with additional USCIS forms to obtain the needed permission for the child to obtain a visa. Pursuant to a new 2000 law, the child is automatically a U.S. citizen when adopted by U.S. citizens, when the child enters American soil. Even when the adoption was finalized overseas, many adoptive parents elect to refinalize the adoption in their home state court. Depending upon the state in which you reside, this re-adoption home study may only require a cursory home study, a full home study, or may not require one at all. Some international adoption programs include the cost of the legal work in the refinalization.
The above list sounds like a lot - and it is. The good news, however, is that virtually all of the above is the job of your international adoption program. So step number one is to find a program. A good program will know the “ins and outs” of working with the USCIS and foreign governmental officials. The program should also know the exact eligibility requirements of the country with which they are working and what, if anything, you would be required to do in the child's country to legally complete the adoption and bring the child home.- Fees can vary in international adoptions as much as in domestic adoptions. Most programs charge between $18,000-$45,000 for the total costs, excluding your airfare hotel and food. Adoptive parents must be very cautious in finding out what is covered in the program fee. Some programs do not cover the cost of the translator, car and driver while you are overseas, which can amount to thousands of dollars. Some don’t include the dossier or the orphanage donation (a financial gift to the orphanage to help the children left behind). Ask any international adoption program what their fee includes, and if it does not include these key elements, find out those costs. Only then will you have the actual total (pre-placement home study, dossier preparation, authentication and translation, USCIS/consulate fees in the U.S. and overseas, car and driver or other local travel, in-country authentication fees, in-country court or attorney fees (if any), orphanage donation fees, post-placement home study fees (if required by your child’s country), readoption fees (if elected by adoptive parents as it is often voluntary to more quickly generate a U.S. birth certificate). Your travel and hotel and food costs are almost always outside any international adoption program’s services, so adoptive parents should expect to pay that directly.
It is recommended you visit the Adoption101.com seminars regarding “Agency Adoption” and “Independent Adoption” seminars, for tips on questions to ask agencies or attorneys, as many of the same questions are appropriate for domestic and international adoption.
What about the Kids?
A frequent question by those considering adoption is “What do kids look like who have been adopted from overseas?” They are boys and girls. They are of all different ages and ethnicities. Some are fully healthy and some were adopted with knowledge of special needs. In other words, they are like the rest of us, just born elsewhere and usually under less fortunate circumstances.
Others ask about a child’s ability to bond with new adoptive parents, and the adjustment to a new country, new language, et cetera. A critical book for adoptive parents on such issues is Lois Melina’s Raising Adopted Children. To summarize a complicated issue, however, children can be amazingly adaptable. More so that we adults. Most international adoptive parents report the complete bonding between themselves and their adopted children, although there is a period of building trust. Also, children, whether adopted internationally or domestically, who have suffered trauma, even at an early age, may have lost the ability to ever fully bond with their new parents. For this reason, it is important to seek to adopt a child who was nurtured, not neglected, loved and not abused, in as much as that can be accomplished in an orphanage setting.
A quality international adoption program will usually be able to help you learn such facts about the child you will be adopting. There are hundreds of thousands of happy international adoption stories out there. They are at your local school, your church, or down the street. Ask, and you will be surprised how many families created from international adoption are around you. Ask them questions. Learn from their knowledge, and from their mistakes. You will find most of them did not fall into their successful adoption, however. They educated themselves enough to select the right program to assist them in the most important decision of their lives – the adoption of their child.
The wrong marriage can be ended with a trip to a divorce attorney. An adoption is for life. Take as much, or more, time with your preparation for it as you would your marriage. It is important to realize children, even those “saved” from sometimes terrible environments to live in their new American homes, will not shower their parents with a lifetime of gratitude, and be perfect children in their desire to p lease. Those adopting for those reasons should reevaluate their motivations to adopt. Kids will be kids, and the same headaches a bio parent experiences with their child will fall on the shoulders of an adoptive parent, plus a few extra issues to boot.
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