How do older kids do?

First off, you are right that U.S. immigration law allows the granting of an adoption visa only if an "orphan petition" is filed before his/her 16th birthday. The sole exception is that an orphan petition can be filed before a young person's 18th birthday IF the adopting family already has adopted his/her biological sibling. Do be aware that some countries may set a lower maximum age for an adoptable child. As an example, China says that a child is no longer adoptable once he/she has had his/her 14th birthday. Unfortunately, many unadoptable young people who currently live in orphanages are not being prepared for productive adulthood. Many orphanages lack the resources to provide vocational training, for example, so that the young people will be able to earn a living. This is especially true in the case of young people with disabilities. Orphanages rarely have the means to help bright young people obtain a college education. In fact, in some countries, many children in orphanages get very little basic instruction, so that they wouldn't qualify for college in any case. As a result, young people who have grown up in orphanages may have a bleak future, especially if constrained resources in the facilities mean that they are required to find other sources of housing and shelter, after a certain age. Some, who are highly intelligent, may wind up trying to find a job, with no more than a fifth or sixth grade education. Some become beggars, prostitutes, and criminals. The suicide rate is said to be high. To their credit, some American adoption agencies are trying to address these issues, rather than just placing children for adoption. I don't want to appear to be favoring any particular agency, but I'll mention a few that have humanitarian aid programs related to older children: 1. WACAP raises funds to provide vocational training instructors for hearing-impaired young people in India. 2. Children's Home Society of Minnesota funds vocational training programs in Khabarovsk, Russia. 3. World Child works with the Living Stones Village program in Nanning, China, which provides elementary education for children through sixth grade, then helps them move into vocational or secondary education. 4. Villa Hope provides scholarships to a school for the deaf, as well as for hearing aids for deaf students, in Bolivia. 5. Adoptions Together, through its Children in Common program, funds woodworking and tailoring programs for older children in orphanages in Eastern Europe and elsewhere. 6. Bethany Christian Services has developed a life skills training program for young people approaching age 18 in Kiev, Ukraine. 7. Carolina Adoption Service provides financial support to Moldovan orphans who have aged out of the orphanage system, so that they can have housing, food, and education or vocational training. 8. The CASI Foundation for Children trained the director of an orphan school in Liaoning, China, to offer an ability-based curriculum and vocational education programs, including a dental hygienist training program. Whether or not you become able to pursue adoption, you may well want to contribute to such programs. You can learn more about them by contacting adoption agencies individually. You may also be able to get information on a number of agencies' humanitarian aid efforts for older children in orphanages by contacting the Joint Council on International Children's Services, a membership organization of licensed, nonprofit adoption agencies. Sharon

I can just give you some information concerning point 3): I've had a lot of experience with exchange students from other countries coming to Germany (I'm German). They're usually between 14 and 17 years old. All of them were able to communicate in German after living in a German host family for 3-4 months. After 6 months they usually become fluent and after 1 year all of them are able to take exams etc. at school like every German teen. They did not have additional German classes, except for 45min per week, provided voluntarily by some soon-to-be teachers. So most of the language they just picked up from daily life. Of course exchange students can not easily be compared with teens who come from orphanages. They may have problems these "normal" teens from abroad were never facing and which may slow down the orphan's language learning. Nevertheless, I thought this "6-12 months rule" could be a bit of an orientation for what to expect. Furthermore, as German is much more difficult to learn than English (I'm sure of it as I teach both languages), the language acquisition may work a bit faster and easier for English speaking countries that for German speaking ones.

I think it depends on several factors as to whether the kids could get to college level english at that age. Consulting with educators here, they tell me that it takes 5-7 years to become proficient in academic english. It will also depend on what kind of education a child has in their home country and whether that education included study of english.Our son had three years of english classes in middle school before he came although he didn't speak much and swears he never studied and was at the bottom of his class. He has been here 8 months and in school 3. His speaking has come a long way but he still speaks mainly in sentence fragments and has not yet mastered the past tense. He has two hours of direct ESL instruction every day in school. His reading and writing progress is slow although he is learning a lot from Facebook. I anticipate/hope that his spoken/social english will be at an intermediate level by the end of the school year. I worry that he may not pass the state exam for graduation, but we are taking it one day at a time. My sense is that if he plans to go to college it will contain an ESL component, as our local community college has an ESL program many international students attend.

Some research actually says even more than 5-7 years to develop full academic English proficiency. Up to 10 is what I have seen in some information. a person can usually learn conversational English fairly quickly, but the academic English needed for school is very complex. Think of all the ways that words can be used in a science class that are different from how we use the same words in general conversation. The references and figurative language in literature can be very difficult for someone who does not know about all the cultural references. If the child has not had schooling equivalent to American schools, they need to learn academic content in science, math, social studies etc. as well as the language. Even kids who did well in school may have a challenge because they are not used to our way of approaching subjects like math.It is also important to note as the earlier poster said-- previous exposure to English helps, as does literacy in the first language.All that said, there is no law that says a child has to go to college at 18. Some students come here and spend extra time in high school or get their GED before going on to college or work. It is not an easy road and definitely takes hard work and lots of supports, but can be done.

We adopted three Russian girls. They were 8, 10, and 11. They were in english as a second language classes for 10 years of their schooling. They didn't possess good Russian skills when they came and so their general language was very limited and that didn't assist them in learning English. I think that English learning for a 13 and 16 would depend upon the skills they have in Russian, their motivation to learn English and do well in English schooling, and their attitude in coming to the United States.