WANTED: Social Worker
We are reaching out to our online Kaz community!
Our home study and CIS paperwork states that we are approved for a child 0-36 months. Since our little guy is almost 5, we need to get our home study updated before court and we will also need to get our CIS approval updated. Long story short, since we are no longer working with an agency - the Social Worker that did our paperwork is unable to help us. Do any of you know a Social Worker licensed for International Adoption that could help us? We're really not sure what's entailed and hope that we can work on this with someone remotely.
Has anyone else done this before? Any words of advice?
Thanks in advance!
Cortney
posted by The Stone's @ 10:01 AM
10 Comments
10 Comments:
We have a wonderful lady who is in Washington State who we have worked with and she has been able to help us with post placement reports since we moved to Oregon. She is familiar with the Kaz adoptions and is extremely fast. We usually got our report within 2 days. Here is her contact info:
joann.vesper@gmail.com
JoAnn Vesper, MSW, LICSW
Adoption Services
PO Box 28205
Bellingham, WA 98228
I hope this helps. How frustrating to be in Kaz and still have to worry about paperwork.
Tesha Kuhl
teshak@nwlink.com
PH: 360-714-9189
Fax: 360-395-6978
I thought your social worker had to be from your state of residence. I may be wrong - but you need to make sure about this. You may want to google your hometown and see who there can answer your questions, just to be sure.
I also believe that for an update that is intended to change immmigration clearance, it has to be a social worker within your home state (as then the new home study will go on to your "local" USCIS). I'm not sure what state you live in, but there is an International Adoption Yahoo board for most states. We had a couple of tricky situations in our home study, and I found a great social worker by reaching out to our state's International Adoption Yahoo group. We have had to update our home study for USCIS a few times -- our social worker charges us $700 each time. (I have no idea if that's steep or cheap!). Good luck!
Karen.
Oh, how frustrating! If there is any way to get the same social worker to do the update for you, then I would think that would be the easiest.
I had to have a homestudy update last October when I switched to Kazakhstan and the agency not only needed to be licensed in my state but also had to be Hague Accredited. Even though Kazakhstan is not a Hague country yet, they are acting as if they are. There is a list of Hague Accredited agencies by state here: http://adoption.state.gov/hague/accreditation/agencies.html.
I am an adoption social worker (and know JoAnn Vesper very well and could recommend her). However you must have a licensed social worker from your state amend /update your home study. You can find one by contacting your state licensing authority.
If you were using an international adoption agency to complete your home study I can understand why they delcined. Any adoption agency in your state should be able to help you and you should also be able to contact an Independent Licensed Social Worker like myself to help you with this if your state approves of this.
It is too bad your social worker won't work with you for the amendment to validate to USCIS that you can provide for the needs of an older adoptive child.
I do not think you need a Hague approved agency to do this as your process is currently not a Hague process and you are not going through an international adoption agency. USCIS does not require this.
This is a requirement for agencies that work with Kakzah adoptions not for USCIS.
One of my families,who is using your same contacts in Kakzahstan, just updated her study and fingerprints and used me as an Independent Licensed Social Worker with no problem.
It's not a big process and you can do it when you return between trips.
I wish you the best.
Nichoe Lichen, MSW, LICSW
Santa Fe, New Mexico
nichoe@earthlink.net
Hello,
I am sending you info on our social worker even though I do not know what state you are in, etc. America world Adoption Agency does Home Study updates as well for people from other agencies. You might check with them. They have done this for us and have been such a huge blessing! They have had to help me get an I171 update.
awaa.org is their web-site.
Their number is 888-one-child
Best Wishes!
I am also a SWer (though I do foster care adoption), and ditto to what Nicole said. Also, $700 is very reasonable. Here (in St. Louis) an update will run you $500-$1200.
An update is really simple to do, so if you have someone in the US (family member) who can call local agencies and get quotes and time frames for you, that would be best. Some will be willing to turn it around quickly and at a reasonable price; some will be less inclined to do so.
I wish you luck! Wish I could help!
Brooke
Cortney, you might contact:
Laura Jackson
Child Placement Management Staff
Generations Adoptions
400 Schroeder
Waco, Texas 76710
Phone: 254.741.1633
Fax: 254.741.0991
laura@generationsadoptions.org
She did my recent home study to adopt my daughter last Fall. She is absolutely terrific and very responsive. Her agency is Hague accredited. She traveled to Austin, so I know that she travels.....although I doubt she'll travel to Kazakhastan. (Ok, I added that to provide a little humor in an otherwise stressful situation.)
I've also helped her in getting their forms written correctly so that I could get them apostilled. If you need help on that front, let me know. I only live 10 minutes away from the Secretary of State's Office. Having been through two Kaz adoptions, I know their processes fairly well.
Let me know if I can be of help.
Susan Moore
smooretexan@yahoo.com
P.S. I'm so sorry to hear of the trouble you had with EG.
I don't know about if you have to be in state, but we use an independent social worker in Shreveport, La. They are very fast and reasonably priced. It's Holy Cross Child Placement and the email is Domahea@aol.com.
I hope all works out. We had to get paperwork done and sent to us over there too--very frustrating and it actually didn't come until about 30 minutes before our court appt. Nerve racking!
Now that you're in Pavlodar, some tips on restaurants: The Old Englishman has killer taco salad and good lasagna too. And Classic Pizza is also really good.
Best of luck!
LMI..Anna Hauser Sellmyer. She's right outside of Austin, Pfluggerville. Licensed SW, and so few are....very professional but personable, has done at least 5 Kaz families.
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