Adoption & Adopted 
VOA-Ethiopia is planning to shut down dozens of orphanages and withdraw accreditation from several foreign adoption agencies, in an effort to halt what critics say is a thriving baby business.
The Bright Hope transition center in Addis Ababa is a showcase child care facility, financed by a faith-based Texas charity. Twenty abandoned children, ranging in age from several months to four years, play in a carefully supervised environment as they wait to be placed in adoptive homes.
Bright Hope Director Getahun Nesibu Tesema says most of these orphans will be taken in by extended family members in Ethiopia.
"Our main focus is to help the children here in Ethiopia," Getahun said. "Adoption, international adoption especially, is our last resort."
But Bright Hope is an exception among foreign adoption agencies, in that it tries to place children within Ethiopia. This year, foreigners will take away about 5,000 Ethiopian orphans, often paying between $20,000 and $35,000 each for the privilege.
Half that number, nearly 2,500, will go to the United States. That is a ten-fold increase above the numbers just a few years ago.
U.S. Senator Mary Landrieu, co-chair of the Congressional Adoptions Coalition recently stopped at Bright Hope during a visit to the country that is becoming the destination of choice for Americans adopting overseas. Landrieu says it is easy to see why the number of Ethiopian orphans going to the United States has skyrocketed.
"One of the reasons is because people in America are falling in love with Ethiopian children," Landrieu said. "They love them. It's very simple. They think they're beautiful and smart."
The rapid rise in Ethiopian adoptions has set off alarm bells among children's lobby groups. The U.S. State Department issued a statement this month expressing concern about reports of adoption-related fraud, malfeasance and abuse in Ethiopia.
The statement warns prospective adoptive parents to expect delays in the adoption process. It says additional information may be required to determine facts surrounding a child's relinquishment or abandonment and whether the child meets the definition of orphan, under U.S. Immigration law.
Embassy consular officials say nearly two years of data collection has enabled them to identify individuals and agencies involved in unusual adoption activities.
U.N. Children's Fund in Addis Ababa chief Doug Webb says the large amount of money changing hands in adoptions is a huge temptation in an impoverished country.
"Money is a powerful factor in this country," Webb said. "We're talking about $20-25,000 per adoption coming into the country. And, there is increasing evidence of irregularities within the system of various types of problems at different levels. And, these have been well documented by PEAR."
Parents for Ethical Adoption Reform did a study of Ethiopia, this year, after detecting a pattern of troubles similar to those in Vietnam and Guatemala before they were closed to American adoptions. The PEAR study turned up evidence of unethical practices by adoption agencies and the use of coercive methods to persuade mothers to give up their babies.
Conditions in orphanages were found to be particularly severe. Some had no running water or sanitary facilities. Children are said to have suffered sexual abuse and beatings.
Ethiopian officials say their own studies confirm PEAR's findings. Mahadir Bitow, head of Ethiopia's Child Rights Promotion and Protection Director tells VOA one of the first priorities will be to close dozens of orphanages that appear to have sprung up to meet the demand for children.
"Before 6-7 years there were not a lot of orphanages, like there are now, so the increased number of adoption agencies brought about the increase in the number of orphanages in Ethiopia," Mahadir said. "Most of these orphanages are not orphanages. They are transit homes. They receive children. They give to adoption. They are a (pipeline). So in the future we will not need all these orphanages."
Mahadir would give no time frame for shutting down orphanages that exist simply to fill the demand in the United States and a few other Western countries for Ethiopian babies.
She acknowledges the plan to close as many as 25 percent of the country's orphanages could create temporary havoc, as officials scramble to place thousands of de-institutionalized children. But she says taking away financial incentives should reduce the supply of babies offered for inter-country adoption.
Mahadir tells VOA the government also plans to re-accredit all foreign adoption agencies, using higher standards to weed out those involved in questionable practices. Child care advocates have been urging such a move for years.
Part two of this series will examine whether an impoverished country like Ethiopia, with a weak social services infrastructure, can successfully fight the moneyed interests intent on keeping the baby pipeline open. And, if they do succeed, whether the phenomenon will simply pop up in another part of the globe.
Would You Adopt A Child Of Another Race?
by Stuart McDonald
Adoption is not something to be entered into haphazardly. One must consider all the possible outcomes, occurrences, and obstacles that may arise. This is even more true when a family (or individual) is considering a transracial adoption (when the race of the adopted child is different from that of one or both adoptive parents).
This is not a new issue in the United States. Transracial adoptions nearly stopped for 20 years, from the early 70s to the 90s, when they were condemned as “cultural genocide” by the National Black Social Workers Association (NBSWA). In 1994, after the Metzenbaum Multiethnic Placement Act (which banned any agency receiving federal funds from interfering with adoptions based on race or nationality) was passed, we saw a significant rise in these adoptions. This act, as well as the Interethnic Adoption Provisions amendment, were designed to eliminate racial discriminations within the adoption system. (1)
While the legality of transracial adoption isn’t be up for debate, it’s imperative that we take a hard look at the cultural impact of such adoptions.
Developing a child’s cultural and racial identity is as important as developing his or her intellectual skills. They give the child a sense of pride, heritage, and belonging. Gloria Batiste Roberts, president of the NBSWA, believes that, “children deserve the right to be with people who look like them, people who understand what they are going through, who understand their culture.” But why should it matter?
“[The NBSWA] points out that a black child growing up in a white family will never learn about his or her own culture and will therefore never develop a positive self-image. White parents can never provide a black child with sufficient information about what it is like to be black in a predominantly white society.” (2)
Interestingly, “in a study of 30 adolescent black children adopted by white parents, only 10 of them identified themselves as black; 6 said they were ‘mixed,’ and the rest tried to avoid a racial identity altogether by saying they were ‘human’ or ‘American.’” (3)
If a Black, Chinese, or Brazilian child is adopted by a White family, at some point questions are going to arise as to why they look different. (I refer to White families here because, in transracial adoptions, Whites are more likely to adopt than are other races.) And no matter how hard I try, I cannot personally identify with the struggles of those who don’t look like me because I’ve never experienced them for myself. Sure, I can hear about their stories and comprehend them as I would a movie or fiction book, but having never lived them out, my “knowledge” can only go so far. The same proves true for parents. A White parent cannot adequately explain what it’s like to be anything other than White in America.
Some might say that none of this race talk really matters; that kids should be raised by whomever is willing to provide a loving and supportive home. And while that may be true, there are certain issues that can’t be overlooked.
For a Black child, one of those issues would be the history of Blacks in America, beginning with the origins of the Atlantic Slave Trade. While White parents may understand and be able to articulate the concepts, ideas, and history of slavery in America, it may be difficult for the child to process the fact that someone who looks like their parent once owned someone who looked like them. No doubt this would bring about some confusion in the child’s mind.
Perhaps equally as important is ensuring that the child develops a healthy self image and self respect. With America being heavily undated and influenced by Euro-centric concepts of beauty, it’s crucial for children of color to understand that they are no less beautiful or attractive just because they don’t “match” with those around them. Nowhere would this lesson be more important than in the home. It would prove to be a challenge for White parents to effectively affirm a child’s appearance when they’ve never known the issues associated with creating a positive self image in spite of the mainsteam, Euro-centric image that America deems as beautiful.
Newsweek finds that, “according to a study published last year by the Evan B. Donaldson Adoption Institute, transracial parents are often ill equipped to raise children who are themselves unprepared for the world’s racial realities.”
In an interview with ABC News, Rita Taddonio, director of the Adoption Resource Center at The Spence-Chapin Adoption Agency in New York City, which facilitates many transracial adoptions, says, “If you look around your table and your guests are all the same color, if you don’t have diversity around your kitchen table then you shouldn’t be adopting a child of a different color.”
“We recommend parents connect to the black community, that they make sure they have friends in those areas, that they go to a black church or be part of the community as well,” Taddonio continues. “Every parent’s job is to help them form an identity, it’s just an additional layer of complexity when your child’s identity has pieces of it that you don’t own.”
We’ve talked primarily about Black children and White parents thus far. But in all fairness, what would happen if the situation were reversed? What if it was a White child being raised by Black parents? That’s the topic examined by a 2009 Newsweek article entitled, “ Raising Katie: What adopting a white girl taught a black family about race in the Obama era” covers. The article states:
Katie [the white daughter]… has sometimes struggled with her unusual situation, and how outsiders perceive it. When she’s not drawing, swimming or pining after teen heartthrob Zac Efron, she’s often dealing with normal kid teasing with a nasty edge. ‘They’ll ignore me or yell at me because I have a black family,’ she says. Most of her friends are black, although her school is primarily white. And Terri has noticed something else: Katie is uncomfortable identifying people by their race.
But even if Katie feels different now, the Riding-Smiths [her adopted family] have given her both a stable home and a familiarity with two ethnic worlds that will surely serve her well as she grows up in a country that is increasingly blended.
If Blacks would adopt their own, Whites wouldn’t have to, right? “Census studies indicate that blacks adopt at about the same rate as whites, but to successfully place all the black children available for adoption [with black families], experts estimate blacks would need to adopt children at three times the rate of white families.” (4) While there are significant societal issues which have lead to the high population of Black children waiting to be adopted at work, many would also argue that there is a systemic bias against Black families who wish to adopt.
Many private adoption agencies can charge fees well into the thousands of dollars, and some feel a certain taboo behind paying for a Black child. Agencies which may not be privatized are normally geared more towards the White middle-class in their mindset and operation, believing that many Black families don’t have what it takes to adopt a child from foster care. The Black families may be subject to higher levels of scrutiny when it comes to their living conditions, income level, or background as well. All in all, the process is much more challenging for a Black family than it would be for a White family if all things were considered equal.
At the end of the day, perhaps it’s more of a personal choice than anything else. In an age where families and children are becoming more and more racially and culturally mixed, perhaps transracial serves to further blur the lines of how we define race in America. Or perhaps it delineates the lines even more. What do you think?
After 10 years of longing for children, a faculty-in-residence and her partner adopt two Ethiopians
Tesfanesh and Elsae Seplow were born in an Ethiopian village, where their family slept under the same thatched roof as cows and pigs.
The people of the village lived in mud huts, and inside were ditches to hold the livestock.
Eventually, disease and poverty forced Tesfanesh and Elsae’s family to give them up in the hope that they could find a richer life.
From the countryside, the siblings moved into an orphanage, then into an adoption agency’s communal living space.
Now Tesfanesh, 5, and Elsae, 2, live in Rieber Hall with their new family. Suzanne Seplow, executive director for the Office of Residential Life and First Year Experience, recently adopted the siblings with her partner, Robin Seplow.
“What is a family like?” Suzanne Seplow asked Tesfanesh, pulling her onto her lap.
“Sometimes they have two daddies. Or a mommy and a daddy … same color or different colors,” responded Tesfanesh, who calls her parents “mommy” and “mama.”
Suzanne and Robin Seplow first wanted to become mothers 10 years ago, and for a long time, they hoped but were never able to celebrate.
In the beginning, the couple spent three years on expensive fertility treatments. Despite going through rounds of treatments, they could not get pregnant.
“Your emotions go up and down. You’re thinking, ‘This is going to be it, this is going to be the month,’” Robin Seplow said.
She remembers her first miscarriage, sitting in the waiting room of the doctor’s office and getting cramps in her abdomen. When she and Suzanne Seplow went in for the ultrasound, they saw the baby’s heartbeat die out.
When the grief and disappointment became too much to bear, they decided to try the L.A. County foster care system. They planned to be foster parents for a year and then try for adoption.
The couple child-proofed their apartment, bought a bunk bed and waited for the call saying they had been matched with a child.
But the call never came.
Disenchanted with the system, Robin and Suzanne Seplow finally turned to international adoption. They chose Ethiopia because they fell in love with the country’s people.
“Every person we meet from Ethiopia is gracious and loving and welcoming,” Suzanne Seplow said. “People comment to us what a great thing we’re doing, but we really feel like we’re the ones that are blessed. We gained as much as we were potentially giving.”
The two-year adoption process ended in February, when the couple traveled to the adoption agency’s community living space in Addis Ababa and met their children for the first time.
“(Tesfanesh) came running to us and gave us big hugs. She was calling us ‘mommy.’ That’s about all the English she knew,” Suzanne Seplow said.
At the time, Elsae was a fragile child. He was likely born 10 weeks premature, had gone hungry on many occasions and had survived the measles.
During their trip, Suzanne and Robin Seplow also made an eight-hour drive to the countryside to visit the family of their new children. A translator read a letter they had written that described the home and opportunities that were waiting in Los Angeles.
“The family was very curious about what was going to happen, if we would let them come back and visit,” Robin Seplow said. “With a lot of Ethiopian adoptions, it’s not unusual for families to go back and visit their children’s family throughout their life. … We definitely have a strong commitment to go back and make sure the kids remain connected.”
On the plane ride back from Ethiopia, Tesfanesh sat beside a man from Kenya. During the flight, the attendants started serving food and gave the children their meals first. When Tesfanesh saw that she had food but her neighbor did not, a horrified look appeared on her face.
“(Tesfanesh) picked up her tray and went to pass it to him,” Robin Seplow said. “In Ethiopia, it doesn’t matter if you can barely feed your family. You always serve your guest first.”
Robin and Suzanne Seplow plan to keep their children’s Ethiopian roots intact. A friend who owns an Ethiopian restaurant supplied them with the country’s food, such as injera, a type of bread. The family also celebrated the Ethiopian New Year.
But it can be difficult raising children from another culture, Robin Seplow said. At first, Tesfanesh didn’t understand how dangerous cars are, or that glass will shatter if dropped – both were totally foreign.
“For many, many nights we cried ourselves to sleep,” Robin Seplow said. “The first week was probably the most difficult we’ve had in almost 20 years together. We had two children, we were sleep deprived, and we’re 45-year-olds.”
Since then, they’ve learned more about parenting and about Ethiopian culture. They’ve learned how to care for their children’s hair and skin, which is different from theirs. They’ve learned about each other and re-fallen in love.
In the backyard patio of their apartment, the two parents alternately scold and kiss their children, and they are all at home.
Sesame Street Writer Pens "I Love My Hair" Song to Empower A-Ethiopian Daughter
Jenee Darden.
The last time I pranced around the house singing a Sesame Street song was in the 1980s. But last week, while working my twists in an up do, I caught myself singing, "I love my hair, I love my hair." I heard the song from the Sesame Street video that went viral last week.
The video features a brown Muppet with an afro proudly singing why she loves her hair. On my blog Cocoa Fly, I wrote about how the spunky character touched the little black girl in me. The same little black girl who wanted her kinky hair to blow in the wind like Marsha Brady's golden locks. Last year, Sesame Street's head writer and puppeteer Joey Mazzarino noticed his then four-year-old daughter, Segi, didn't embrace her hair. For those with little ones, Mazzarino voices the characters Murray Monster and Papa Bear. Mazzarino and his wife adopted their daughter from Ethiopia when she was a baby. He shared with me why he wrote the "I Love My Hair" lyrics for his little girl. Here's an interview:
Darden: Where did the concept of the "I Love My Hair" sketch come from?
Mazzarino: I have a five year old and she's African American. My wife and I are both white. When she was four we were going through stuff with her hair where she wanted to have hair that was straight. I tried to say to her, "Your hair's great. It's so beautiful and you can do so many things with it." I thought it was a problem unique to us because we were white parents and she saw us everyday. Then Chris Rock's movie Good Hair came out and I realized it's not just about being raised by white parents. It's an issue for a lot of little girls.
When did the sketch debut?
We shot it at the end of last year and it debuted October 4 of this year. We got this great composer, Chris Jackson to work with me and came up with the song.
Did you know anything about issues surrounding black hair prior to writing this song?
No, not about girls not being proud of their hair. I didn't know how to take care of [her hair]. I don't take care of my own hair very well and I didn't want my daughter to go out with wild hair. Are you familiar with Carol's Daughter?
Yeah.
Well [founder] Lisa Price's husband works on Sesame Street and he's one of our crew members. He would bring in stuff for me and Lisa would tell me, "Okay this is how you do this..." My wife is an actress and if she was away I would be in charge of my daughter's hair. I made sure it looked good. Thanks to Lisa and [her husband] Gordon they taught me how to use certain products.
How was that process of learning how to do hair?
I'm still not great at braids, but I try.
You do cornrows or just regular braids?
I do standard braids. I don't know what I'm doing. It was hard to get used to but I love doing it with my daughter.
You start the song "Don't need a trip to the beauty shop, because I love what I got on top." Right there we're drawn in because many black women spend lots of time and money in salons. Why did you start the song with that line?
Nothing against the beauty industry, but this is for my daughter. Everything in that song is what I want to say to my daughter. [I want her to know] you don't need to change. That's where you go to change so it just naturally felt like the place to start the song.
Did you ever take her to a salon?
The only salon we've been to is some [princess salon] at Walt Disney World... But I think she's out of the princess stage now.
I have a cousin who is seven and she's out of the princess stage. She loves Barbie.
My daughter loves Barbie. That's one of my issues. She loves Barbie, but I wish they would have natural hair on Barbie. They have that great line of Barbies made for African American girls -- "So In Style." We have them all, but I wish some of them came with curly hair.
Who is the singer in the video? She sang with a lot of pride.
Her name is Chauncey Johnson. She's an actress who was in the Lion King at the time. She's amazing... Normally we puppeteers sing the songs but we wanted to have a real sounding kid.
Are your surprised by the reactions of this sketch on the internet?
I got a call from a state senator's office the other day and the woman I spoke to was one of his deputy's secretaries. She said, "I'm an older African American woman and I started to cry when I saw it." It really touched me and I started reading the comments. Saturday I had my iPhone with me and I was with my daughter. She was taking a nap on me. And I started to cry when I read them. You know you write this stuff in a dark room by yourself. I just wrote it hoping my kid would be happy with who she was. The fact that it touched not only kids but adults makes me feel great.
What has been your daughter's reaction?
I brought it home the day we shot it. She was dancing around and loved it.
Have you noticed a change in her since hearing the song?
I don't know if she has been exposed enough to the song to change perspectives on her hair. But, last year, her pre-K teacher was this wonderful African-American teacher who taught her about Africa. She took us up to Harlem to find this Queen of Sheba Ethiopian doll. And I think she has taken a lot more pride in her hair and her skin and everything else. It was great to have a positive and strong African-American woman in her life. I think that helped change her perspective more than my song. I hope I had a little part in it. We're always super positive to her and telling her how beautiful she is.
The video is also funny because the Muppet changes her hairstyle many times. And black women are known for changing their hairstyles. I've gone to work on Friday with a bob, then returned on Monday with braids down my back. [Laughter][Laughter]
Do you think people will be surprised that you're white and wrote this song?
I hope not because I really want the song to be about the message and not me. If they do, I hope it doesn't affect their feelings of the song because it really comes from a place of love for my daughter.
NEW YORK – As the overall number of international adoptions by Americans plummets, one country — Ethiopia — is emphatically bucking the trend, sending record numbers of children to the U.S. while winning praise for improving orphans' prospects at home.
It's a remarkable, little-publicized trend, unfolding in an impoverished African country
with an estimated 5 million orphans and homeless children, on a continent that has been wary of international adoption.
Just six years ago, at the peak of international adoption, there were 284 Ethiopian children among the 22,990 foreign kids adopted by Americans. For the 2010 fiscal year, the State Department projects there will be about 2,500 adoptions from Ethiopia out of fewer than 11,000 overall — and Ethiopia is on the verge of overtaking China as the top source country.
The needs are enormous; many of Ethiopia's orphans live on the streets or in crowded institutions. There's constant wariness, as in many developing countries, that unscrupulous baby-sellers will infiltrate the adoption process.
However, a high-level U.S. delegation — led by Sen. Mary Landrieu, D-La., and Susan Jacobs, the State Department's special adviser on children's issues — came back impressed from a visit to Ethiopia last month in which they met President Girma Wolde-Giorgis.
"What's encouraging is they want to work with us, they want to do it right," Jacobs said in a telephone interview. "Other countries should look at what Ethiopia is trying to do."
Read more....
Pilot Project Helps Ethiopian Orphans Avoid Overseas Adoption
The Ethiopian government and a faith-based U.S. charity are teaming up on an experimental project to help orphans thrive in their home countries rather than be put up for adoption overseas. From the town of Bantu, our correspondent reports that the U.S. government is studying the project as Ethiopia becomes the nation of choice for American families seeking international adoptions.
Hundreds of Bantu's tiniest children stand in a muddy field at the Bright Hope Education Center, singing a welcome song to a team of foreign visitors led by U.S. Senator Mary Landrieu of Louisiana.
Three years ago, Bantu was little more than a collection of huts connected to the outside world by a footpath. Its population was decimated by drought and disease. Countless orphans were left to fend for themselves.
Today, many of these orphans attend classes and receive two meals a day at the newly built Bright Hope Education Center. The center is a joint project of the Ethiopian government and the Buckner Foundation, a Texas-based charity dedicated to helping children, and Ethiopia's Bright Hope Church.
Senator Landrieu has come to Bantu to look at how the project can be used as a model for reaching orphans and impoverished children worldwide.
"This is an example of an exciting partnership that is absolutely scalable," said Senator Mary Landrieu. "This road, electricity and compound was built within three years - extraordinary when you think about it. Over 600 children receiving education here, some of the poorest of the poor because this partnership between Ethiopia's government and a foundation, we would call it a charity, has brought private money from the U.S., matching the money from the government of Ethiopia creates an exciting opportunity."
Forty million Ethiopians, half the country's population, are less than 18 years of age. The United Nations Children's Fund estimates that 5.5 million of them are orphans, meaning that each has lost at least one parent.
The sheer number of orphans and Ethiopia's relatively lenient adoption standards help explain the rapid rise in the number of Ethiopian children being adopted in the West.
Five years ago, Ethiopia provided only two percent of foreign children adopted in the United States. By last year, that figure had jumped to 18 percent. Analysts say trends indicate that Ethiopia will surpass China this year as the number one country of origin for foreign adoptions by U.S. parents.
But the 5,000 Ethiopian children adopted worldwide last year is a tiny fraction of the country's 5.5 million orphans.
Senator Landrieu says the overwhelming numbers dictate caring for orphans near their birthplace, while international adoption should be a last resort.
"Not just Americans, but many countries around the world desire to follow this international treaty which says children should stay with their birth families," she said. "But if something happens and that child is separated from the mother or father - death or famine or disease - then the treaty says the children should be placed with the nearest kin or relative who is willing or responsible to raise them, and then as sort of the last step, rather than putting the child out on the street or putting the child in an institution where they're not loved and nurtured, to find a family somewhere in the world."
U.S. Ambassador Susan Jacobs, the State Department's adviser for children's issues, accompanied Landrieu to Bantu. At a time when many countries are tightening rules governing adoption, Jacobs says the Bantu model deserves a closer look because it helps Ethiopian orphans to better their lives at home, while identifying the neediest children for placement abroad.
"There are a lot of American families that want to adopt, that feel the need," said Susan Jacobs. "They want a family [or] to complete their family, so we hope adoptions will remain open all over the world and in Ethiopia."
Buckner Foundation President Kenneth Hall acknowledges the Bantu project reaches only a small percentage of Ethiopia's orphans, much less the estimated 140 million orphans worldwide. But he says he is excited about the possibilities of replicating the public-private partnership model internationally.
"When you look at it from the macro, or broad scale, it can be defeating," said Kenneth Hall. "But in the work I'm in, you've got to address the issue. We want to replicate models that work. The resources are available financially from the private sector in partnership with the public sector. That's how you get there. This is not that expensive to do when you partner with a lot of people and you let the national leadership, not only of the government, but [also] the private leaders here. So this is an Ethiopian project with just a little bit of assistance from America."
Pastor Getahun Nesibu Tesema, director of the Bright Hope Education Center says three orphans from Bantu have been adopted by U.S. families during the past three years. Almost all of the rest will remain with relatives in Ethiopia, with nutrition and education assistance from the Buckner Foundation and Bright Hope.
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