Ukraine New Adoption Procedures

I'd be really interested in the answers on this. I talked with an adoption coordinater yesterday who really pushed their Ukraine progam and emailed me their info packet. She told me that things in general were moving quickly, there were a lot of children available, only one trip required, and that the ages started at 18 months. She was very stongly suggesting that since we're just starting the process we select Ukraine instead of Russia.

Well, consider this info first hand since we just got back last Thursday. This was our 2nd adoption, the first in 2004 and let me just tell you things are quite different. The process is very slow, we spent over 5 weeks there. Unfortunately, my husband had to return to his job after court and I stayed with my other two children to wait for the final process. If you can afford time away and like the slower pace of things then go for Ukrainian adoptions. But we were told that Ukraine is trying everything in their power to place their children with Ukrainians. We had several advantages, the child we were adopting was over 10 and is also the sibling to our two other children. No time requirements are waived and what the child has to go through from other orphans who are jealous is very cruel. Every orphan knows when a child is in the process of being adopted and children can be very cruel. If you have any other questions, please PM me.

The SDA (Ukrainian adoption authority) still doesn't have a director. And they still aren't completely staffed. They are processing existing dossiers. I heard they were just processing them in the order they arrived. I know several families who are adopting older children. They haven't received any special treatment. Legally the SDA has 20 business days to process a dossier and assign an appointment date. However due to being short staffed, they are taking 25 to 30 business days. I have heard that some families are getting appointments. Appointment dates are out to June 2007 now. (appointment = travel to Ukraine and get referral to a child) Last week they took 5 dossiers for American families, but didn't accept any others. Typical week is for them to accept 40 dossiers. I haven't heard anything about this week yet.

Here's the latest notice just posted: Dear Members of the American Adoption Community Interested in Ukraine: On April 16, 2007 the State Department for Adoptions and Protection of the Rights of the Child resumed acceptance of new adoption applications from U.S. citizens. All the rules and requirements have remained in place. Please do not hesitate to contact us if you have any additional questions. Sincerely, Adoption Unit/Immigrant Visa SectionConsular SectionAmerican EmbassyKyiv, UkraineTel: 38-044-4904422Fax: 38-044-490-4570Kyivadoptions@state.gov ([url=http://kyiv.usembassy.gov/amcit_adoptions_eng.html]United States Embassy Kyiv, Ukraine - American Citizen Services[/url]) In accordance with E.O. 12958 this message is not classified.

Wow. I never thought of the other children being mean. What happened? Just general kid stuff?

We adopted an older child from Ukraine and the other kids couldn't have been nicer. In fact, our child and some of her friends and caretakers still ocorrespond. So I think it must depend on the kids and on the internat. I wouldn't say the other kids are always mean because in our case this did not happen at all. You do not need an agency to adopt from Ukraine. If you go through a facilitator instead of an agency, you pay very little (about 1500 for dossier prep and translation) before you actually go to Ukraine. That means you cannot be out a large sum of money unless you actually accept a referral to adopt. If your agency isn't charging much, then by all means use them, but if there is a large upfront fee, know that in Ukraine everyone -including agencies-uses facilators.