Posted in Ethics on May 31st, 2007 10 Comments »
Most of us come to adoption with a sense of purpose, and often a feeling of urgency. It may have taken years to make the decision to adopt, but once it’s made, we want things to move along as quickly as possible. It can be daunting and rather frustrating to realize that at minimum three [...]
Posted in Chosing An Agency, The Process on May 29th, 2007 4 Comments »
Recently Jennifer G left a comment about soft referrals. She said:
“According to my agency, some agencies make “soft” referrals of babies/children. That is, they offer referrals before the babies’ dossiers have been officially approved. They say this approval process normally takes four months from the time a baby is found orphaned or abandoned (this period [...]
Posted in Ethics on May 23rd, 2007 7 Comments »
Did you ask your agency????
1. Do you pay unpublished cash fees to the orphanage in any way (donation or otherwise)?
Any kind of unpublished fees provide incentive for for more profits for the cash-strapped orphanages.
2. Do you pay the hospitals in the area of the orphanage(s) you work with “humanitarian support” or any other kind of [...]
Posted in Ethics on May 22nd, 2007 26 Comments »
Picture this: you wait patiently for a referral. You don’t voice a preference for a baby girl or a baby boy, you just want a baby. Your homestudy indicates that you would accept two children but that is more a formality encouraged by your social worker than anything else. Finally it is referral day! The phone rings [...]
Posted in Ethics, Experiences on May 19th, 2007 3 Comments »
I think it is really important to read first hand accounts of other parents’ recent experiences. It is one thing to read about what might happen but it really drives it home as a real viable risk when it has happened to other families out there.
A reader recently posted this story in the comments section and, [...]
Posted in Ethics on May 17th, 2007 2 Comments »
Recently I’ve started thinking about the issue of older children, special needs children and other hard to place orphans and how these adoptions mesh with adoption integrity.
Often times I will hear about a child who has become available through a less-than-reputable agency and it pulls at my heartstrings. And it brings up some issues for [...]
Posted in Ethics, The Process on May 16th, 2007 8 Comments »
Back in 2000-2001 when we decided to adopt internationally, we chose China for all the reasons thousands of people adopt from China every year … the one child policy resulting in thousands of baby girls waiting in orphanges, the streamlined, centralized, time-tested process, etc. Then as the wait to referral stretched to 14 months just [...]
Posted in Ethics on May 7th, 2007 7 Comments »
For those who don’t know, an NOID stands for “Notice of Intent to Deny” and they are given by the US Embassy when there is a decision to deny a newly adopted child their US-entry Visa, essentially creating a situation where the parents can not leave Vietnam with their newly adopted (in the eyes of [...]
Voices for Vietnam Adoption Integrity
A collaborative blog advocating ethics in adoption
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