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The Final Step
Post Adoption Reporting
By Sue Marquette Poremba
The day that Melia Hoffman and Ted McFadden of Bayville, N.J., adopted their two children from Kazakhstan is called "Gotcha Day." One of the things these parents do on each Gotcha Day is prepare each child's post-adoption report. Hoffman created a form that she uses to streamline the process. She records each child's height, weight, overall health, development, daily routine and social life (family and friends). She also includes 5 to 10 photographs. When the report is finished, it is sent to the agency that facilitated the adoption. Because of Kazakhstan's requirements, Hoffman and McFadden will be filing these reports until each child is 18 years old.
Post adoption reports are required for nearly every international adoption, according to Linda Donovan, the international program director at Adoption Alliance in Denver, Colo. "The reports document the health of the child and what they are doing developmentally," she says. "Some also require a picture of the child as proof the child is thriving. Unfortunately, she adds, there are rumors that circulate that Americans adopt the babies for body parts and other sinister behaviors. While these stories are urban legends, the post adoption reports allow the country administrating the adoption to know the child is in a safe, loving home. In Russia, for example, there was a slow down in adoptions because of the lack of reporting and stories about the children being abused."
"Annual adoption updates are absolutely critical to international adoption," says Michelle Madrid-Branch, author of Adoption Means Love: Triumph of the Heart (Adoption Tribe Publishing, 2005). "Each family that adopts internationally agrees to cooperate by filing, on time, the appropriate paperwork, along with photos of their child. All families should understand that their non-compliance with this rule could potentially cause another family to lose the opportunity to adopt from another country."