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| Next round of accreditations? |
| Thursday, September 27, 2007 |
A little soapbox oratory about the whole process of accreditation.
First let me say that there have been a number of rumblings in various sources about the next batch of accreditations.
Side note: The term accreditations is not really valid anymore since the rules of the game have changed a bit with government decree #654. However the term "means" something to most people so I too still use it.
Although our agency is already accredited they had mentioned in an online chat that they had heard through the grapevine that there were another batch of agencies that were about to be accredited. It appears that one of the main reasons "why" agencies are getting accredited is how well they adhere to post-placement reports. Agencies that have had a bad history or filing these are finding it very difficult to gain accreditation.
For those who don't know, post-placement reports are a legal requirement of adopting from Russia (and most other international adoptions). They are very simple and painless and are conducted (usually) by the same social worker who interviewed you for your home-study. They visit you with your child and just see how everything is working out. It is very similar to how the social worker visited you in your house for the home-study. They're not holding you up to the light to make sure you are the perfect parent, they just want to see if everything is okay or if you need any advice or assistance to make things okay.
I cannot stress this enough. Beyond the legal obligation (everyone, included us sign a contract stating we will follow through on these reports), the post-placements help future families trying to adopt since, as I mentioned, this is one of the major issues the Russian government uses to authorize accreditations (or revoke them). PLEASE make sure you continue with your post-placement reports. Some people get mad at their agencies and stop doing these for some sense of retaliation against the agency. But keep in mind you are not merely hurting your agency, you are destroying the possibility of people just like you to get their kids.
Although this next round of accreditations is still really just a rumor, there appears to be a strong likelihood that it will be yet another group of about 8-9 agencies (both of the first two groups had that many). Because it appears that it is far more difficult for agencies to gain accreditation than it was in the past, it's my opinion that if you are just starting out you really should sign up with an agency that is already accredited. Again, that's just my opinion but having had to wait 16 months to just be able to go on trip #1, I certainly can tell you that waiting for red tape to clear up is no fun.
The current list of accredited agencies are listed on the Russian Ministry of Education website which you can view in English here. Hopefully this next round of accreditations (which the rumor suggests will happen in early October) will add to this list. |
posted by Steveg @ 7:45 AM  |
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| 2 Comments: |
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Our Agency hasn’t had a late post placement report in over 4 years. And never one missing. We still don’t have accreditation and we are still waiting for the MOI approval... :(
I’m not sure there is a rhyme or reason to this madness.
On a brighter note, Congrats on your new little one, I hope you get to go back for him soon! :)
Erica
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This is very timely. I freaked last week when my homestudy agency sent me the latest post placement, apostilled and ready to go. My placement agency apparently has vanished from the face of the earth. They handled getting this documentation to Russia. THANK GOD, I still had the emails for the actual employee that helped me through what turned out for us to be an independent adoption. She has vowed to get my documents to Russia.
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Our Agency hasn’t had a late post placement report in over 4 years. And never one missing. We still don’t have accreditation and we are still waiting for the MOI approval... :(
I’m not sure there is a rhyme or reason to this madness.
On a brighter note, Congrats on your new little one, I hope you get to go back for him soon! :)
Erica