The Things I Learned...

...at the Agency meeting last night.

As I mentioned in a post yesterday, Tony and I spent yesterday evening at a meeting focused on the Korea Program. Surprisingly there were only three other families attending: one family who accepted a referral last December, missed the "travel in 2012" cutoff by 15 days and are expecting to be in the first round for 2013; one family who accepted a referral in August; and a third family who has been waiting for a girl referral since June 2011 (the wait for a girl referral can be up to two years).

Here are a few things we learned that you might find interesting:

1. I've previously mentioned the new legislation in Korea that went into affect in August. It is an added step to the adoption process, primarily targeted toward domestic adoption but being applied to international adoption as well. The Ministry (in Korea) is working with both the Korean adoption agencies and the court system to determine the best way to proceed. They want to make sure they have everything "figured out" before they move families through the new process. At this time they are working out the kinks and it is unknown how much time this will ultimately add to the process. Estimates range from 1 to 4 weeks.
2. This new law will have a significant impact on domestic Korean adoptions. Without getting into too many details / cultural issues here, it will likely cause a drop in domestic adoptions moving forward. In addition, Korea will continue to reduce the number of international adoptions allowed each year. What doesn't decrease -- the number of children needing a forever family. A very difficult situation, indeed.
3. The meeting also detailed the specifics of the "getting ready to travel" part of the process. We learned that the process currently takes roughly 8 weeks, and they are anticipating that the added step will bring it closer to 12 weeks. It was surprising to learn that the various offices and agencies in Korea require paper copies of everything -- nothing is electronic -- and that an actual person runs all of our paperwork around to the proper places and people. No wonder it takes so long!
4. So, what does all of this mean for Tony and I...and for Oliver? When his file is sent for Emigration Permission (the first step), we will be notified. From that point forward it might be two and a half or three months before we've made it through all of the steps and are told that Oliver is ready for us to bring home. Ultimately, that means we will not be traveling in early 2013. Possibly very late spring/early summer (or later!), but not before. With any luck, however, we will receive the call that our file is on the move sometime in February or March. Of course we will keep everyone posted and, as I've said before, we hope to know a bit more about the overall situation in January.
5. Finally, I learned that it is likely that Oliver's Foster Family is Christian! We are quite happy to hear that. One of the updates we received noted that he goes to Sunday School, and the ESWS agency (our Korean agency) is a Christian organization. We learned that many foster moms are slightly older women who do it as an act of charity and in the company of their fellow church ladies.  :)

It was an interesting meeting and we did get an opportunity to hear more about making the transition once we get home. Much of it was repeated info, but there were a few good nuggets that were worthwhile.