Who Should I Askabout the International Adoption Process?

Who Should I Ask about the International Adoption Process?

by Miriam Vieni, L.C.S.W.

www.nyhomestudy.com

People who are becoming involved in an international adoption for the first time, are confronted with a confusing array of processes and procedures. If you are in this situation, allow me to make some suggestions that will make things a bit clearer for you and will help you know which questions to direct to which agencies and officials.

When you adopt a child from another country, you are actually dealing with three different sets of requirements. What is so confusing is that your placement agency, your home study agency, and the U.S. Citizens & Immigration Service, seem to be asking you for the same things. Actually, in many cases, this is true. In order to be sure that you are providing the right documents in the correct form to the right agency, it helps to have three separate folders. I suggest that you deal with each set of requirements separately. When you choose your placement agency, you will probably need to provide initial information such as a pre-application or application. The placement agency will ask for the name of your home study agency. After you do this, I suggest that you begin gathering the documents and completing the paper work required by your home study agency.

Your Home Study Agency: The amount of paper work varies from agency to agency. However, you are usually asked to complete an application and sign a contract for the services you need from the agency. The services are usually your home study and the post placement reports required by the country from which you’re adopting your child. You may also be asked to sign a release of information form and to provide copies of your birth certificates, marriage certificate, and divorce decrees (if applicable). The home study agency will provide a New York State Central Register form for you to complete for your child abuse clearances and New York State finger print charts to be sent into the State for criminal clearance letters. The clearances can take up to eight weeks to receive and they must be included in your home study report. Remember that the home study takes some time and that it is the first document you’ll need. Another thing to remember is that during the course of your adoption process, you will be asked for three different criminal checks. I know this seems silly and redundant, but it’s necessary. The New York State criminal clearance check is the first and the finger prints can usually be done at your local police precinct.

It is the responsibility of your home study provider to be sure that your home study meets the requirements of New York State, the Immigration Service, and your child’s country. Your home study provider and your placement agency will be in contact in order to be sure that all requirements are met. It is likely that your home study provider will be required to sign an agreement with your placement agency to the effect that the required post placement visits and reports will be completed. Most home study agencies are asking families to pay in advance for the required post placement reports to ensure that families will follow through with post placement requirements. Additionally, in most cases, your home study agency will require that you receive ten hours of pre-adoption training which is now required for adoptions from countries that have signed the Hague Treaty. Although the training is theoretically required only for adoptions from Hague countries, most home study agencies are asking all their families to participate in the training.
The home study agency or social worker should know how your Immigration office works. Even though the U.S. Citizens & Immigration Service is a federal agency, it functions differently in each state because its requirements are tied to state adoption requirements and state requirements vary from state to state. Further, even within New York State, the offices function differently. All of my families deal with the New York City Immigration office so that is the one I know best. It is the responsibility of your home study social worker to help you with Immigration. If you are using a placement agency that is located in another state (as most New Yorkers seem to do), that placement agency will probably not know how the New York City Immigration office functions, unless the agency has many families who live here. It is your home study social worker who will know how long the Immigration process takes and whom to call if you have questions.

There is another way in which your home study social worker can be helpful. Although it is the responsibility of your placement agency to help you compile the dossier for your international adoption and to tell you what processes the documents need to go through, some of the ways in which the processes are done and the locations of government offices, depend on the state in which you live. So, for example, if your placement agency tells you that notarized documents need to be verified, that agency may not know how to get notarized documents verified in New York State. This is where your home study social worker comes in.

Immigration Process: The application to Immigration (CIS) for advanced processing is intimately related to your home study process. So you will be downloading and completing the appropriate forms and gathering the required documents around the same time that you are going through your home study process. The timing for what gets done when, changes from time to time so you’ll need guidance from your home study social worker about this. However, there are certain questions on the forms to which only your placement agency may know the answer. These questions relate to the process in your child’s country and where your file should be sent. Those of us who have been doing international home studies for many years, can usually help you with this. But not all home study providers have this knowledge. Your home study social worker will advise you about getting necessary information from your placement agency. Very capable and responsible placement agencies often automatically take the responsibility of helping you with your Immigration paper work.
Your International Adoption and the Dossier: All of your questions concerning the process of adopting from your child’s country, should be directed to your placement agency. Questions about time frames, ages and health of available children, what documents are required and how the documents should be prepared, what arrangements will be made for you when you visit your child’s country, travel costs and conditions, all this information is the responsibility of your placement agency. Remember that you are retaining your placement agency to represent your interests and to provide services to you so don’t be shy about asking questions. But also be aware that your placement agency is working in your child’s birth country at the behest of that country. The agency is facilitating your adoption but it is the child’s country that makes the rules.
I wrote this article because it has always been my practise to de-mystify the adoption process for my families to the best of my ability and to empower them in a situation in which their control is limited. I have found that the most difficult thing about the international adoption process for most people is their lack of control over what is happening. The best we can do is to help you understand the process as best you can and to know to whom to direct your questions.W

Article Source: http://www.adoptiondoctors.com/articles

Miriam Vieni, L.C.S.W. www.nyhomestudy.com www.nyhomestudy.com/miriam-vieni.htm www.nyhomestudy.net miriamvieni@optonline.net (516) 333-4999 Fax (516) 876-8246

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