After writing my last post about the family who is separated due to struggles with their international adoption and United States Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS), I thought I would write some about the role that USCIS plays in international adoptions and what is involved and required of families in the United States who adopting internationally.

Please take this as general advice and information, and contact your social worker and/or adoption agency with specific questions, as immigration issues are often complicated and there can be many variables with different adoption situations. Also, requirements and procedures can change frequently.

In general, the first step between a prospective adoptive family and USCIS is for the family to file the I600A, Application for Advance Processing of Orphan Petition. In a nutshell, this step preapproves the prospective adoptive parents to bring an "immigrant" orphaned child into the United States.

Parents usually try to submit this early on in their adoption process, and it requires sending in copies of your birth certificates, marriage license (if any), divorce decree (if any) and approved adoption homestudy. As a step in this process, adoptive parents are fingerprinted for an FBI background check. The I600A is submitted to you local USCIS office, and once it is processed the parents receive the ever important I-171H approval.

The fee for the I600A is currently $670 plus $80 per person in the home over the age of 18 for fingerprints. Some offices process these in just a couple of weeks, while others take several months. Also, some offices allow parents to submit their I600A before the homestudy is complete, and others require a completed homestudy before the I600A can be submitted. Check with your homestudy agency for guidance on this.

Once a child is identified, the adoption process is completed in the country of the child and the child is ready to travel home, the I600, Petition to Classify Orphan as an Immediate Relative, is submitted. This form approves the parents to bring that particular child into the United States as an immigrant orphan. The I600 can be submitted in the US at the parents' local USCIS office (usually a slower process), or at the US Consulate or Embassy in the country where the child resides. If the parents submitted the I600A earlier in the adoption process (but not more than 18 months earlier) then there is no additional fee to submit this form. If the I600A was not submitted, then the fee is $670 plus $80 per person for fingerprints.

See my next post for more information on immigration and international adoption.

*Picture from Liquid Library