Hello Heritage Camps Families and Friends! It is still Winter by the calendar, but sure Spring-like here in Denver, although the March wind doth blow! Starting this year, we’ll be producing 4 quarterly newsletters. If you have pertinent community information to send at another time, I am always happy to send that out separately for you, or post it on camp Facebook pages. Hope you have had/are having a great Winter season with your family! This quarter we talk about camp registration of course, ways you can help spread the word, our annual gala not to be missed, IMPORTANT information about international adoptees citizenship and social security documentation, & two quarterly features: why we we do it, and how to bring camp home! Hope you enjoy, get some good information, and take action! Pam Sweetser, Executive Director Calls to Action!Calls to Action! We’d LOVE to hear from you for each newsletter. See below for the “Why We Do It” and “Bringing Camp Home” sections. Send us something to publish, and we’ll be sure to include it next quarter! Also, please “like” your camp’s Facebook page and posts, and share them too! That will help get the word out about your camp to the world, which is a good thing! Each camp has a page. READ MORE for direct links to FB, Twitter, and Instagram! Use your camp’s hash tags when posting too please! Camp Registration Underway!Registration is open for all camps, except Domestic Adoption Camp (opens March 8th), Southeast Asian Pacific Islander Heritage Camp (opens March 8th) and Chinese Heritage Camp at Snow Mtn Ranch (opens March 15th)! REGISTER HERE for all other camps. Some are really filling fast, so don’t let your family get on the waiting list – register TODAY! Remember our +ONE Program! Refer a family to any of our 10 camps and receive market $$! READ MORE for details. Annual HCAF Gala is April 8th!!You're invited to the Annual Gala Benefiting Heritage Camps for Adoptive Families & Celebrating our Strength through Diversity & Inclusion! Time: 5:30 – 9:00 Place: Wings Over the Rockies Air & Space Museum – and awesome location! Tickets: $85 per person, or $850 for a table of 10 – BUY TICKETS HERE! Emcee: Debbie Scheer, camp mom and professional stand-up comic! Entertainment: Great variety of cultural entertainers! Food: Delicious tasting stations from around the world! View Invitation Here for all the details of this always fun event –the ONLY one we hold all year to help us keep camp costs reasonable, provide scholarships, and house and feed our wonderful counselors and presenters, among other things! This event makes a HUGE difference to every camp’s success! Stay tuned for raffle information and the opportunity to help raise funds from afar! Silent Auction items needed! Please contact Maria Collett at maria.collett@heritagecamps.org if you have an item or two to donate. Sponsors needed! Please consider being a signature sponsor of this event for $3,000, $2,000, or $1,000. Contact Pam Sweetser at pam@heritagecamps.org for more information about how you can reach thousands of people with your sponsorship! Important Information Regarding Your Child’s Citizenship Status & Social SecurityWe are aware of the concerns regarding international adoptees of all ages not having the citizenship documents they need to renew passports, complete college financial aid information, etc. So we asked the experts! Here is information from a prominent immigration lawyer for you to review. We hope you find this helpful. If you would like further assistance, please let us know. Question: If a person was adopted internationally before the Child Citizenship Act of 2000, and do NOT have their naturalization paperwork, what steps do they have to take (now as adults) to get that done. have their naturalization paperwork in recent Answer: IF THEY DO NOT HAVE A CERTIFICATE OF NATURALIZATION, THEY PROBABLY ARE NOT CITIZENS. BEFORE THE CHILD CITIZENSHIP ACT, MANY ADOPTIVE PARENTS DID NOT KNOW THAT THEY HAD TO APPLY FOR CITIZENSHIP FOR THEIR ADOPTED CHILDREN -- THAT WAS A BIG REASON WHY CONGRESS PASSED THE ACT IN 2000. THESE ADULT ADOPTED CHILDREN CAN AND SHOULD APPLY FOR CITIZENSHIP AS SOON AS POSSIBLE. THEY FILE FORM N-400. IF THE PERSON WAS UNDER 18 AT THE TIME THE LAW PASSED, THEY PROBABLY ARE CITIZENS. (SEE CHART BLOW ON OBTAINING CERTIFICATION DOCUMENT IF THAT IS THE CASE.) ONE QUESTION THAT SOMETIMES COMES UP IN THESE CASES IS WHETHER THE ADOPTEES VOTED (BECAUSE THEY THOUGHT THEY WERE CITIZENS). EVEN THOUGH VOTING WHEN ONE IS NOT A CITIZEN IS A BIG NO-NO (THAT'S A TECHNICAL TERM), THERE'S AN EXCEPTION FOR PEOPLE WHO REASONABLY BELIEVED THEY WERE CITIZENS. IF THEY ARE APPLYING NOW, I STRONGLY SUGGEST THEY HIRE AN ATTORNEY, JUST TO HELP THE PROCESS GO SMOOTHLY. FIND THE FORM HERE: https://www.uscis.gov/n-400 Question: If a person was adopted internationally after the Child Citizenship Act of 2000 and have only a passport, do they still need to get their naturalization paperwork? Answer: THEY ABSOLUTELY SHOULD APPLY FOR A CERTIFICATE OF CITIZENSHIP USING FORM N-600. THERE HAVE RECENTLY BEEN ADOPTEES WITH U.S. PASSPORTS HAVING A PASSPORT RENEWAL DENIED UNTIL SHE/HE CAN PRESENT A CERTIFICATE OF CITIZENSHIP. HIRING AN ATTORNEY IS NOT AS NECESSARY TO PROCESS THIS FORM, BUT STILL MAY BE PRUDENT TO BE SURE IT IS ALL DONE CORRECTLY. FIND THE FORM HERE: https://www.uscis.gov/n-600 Social Security Information: Even if you DO have the Certificate of Citizenship and passport for your child, the Social Security Admin may still have him or her listed as an “alien.” (meaning immigrant). Though you might think that your child is an alien sometimes (ha-ha), you really do need to get that status removed before your child enters the work force or applies to college. Contact your local Social Security Administration to find out your child’s status. You will need your child's SS# when you call. If you need to change the status, you must physically go with your child to the SS Administration in your town and bring all the citizenship and adoption documentation to get the status changed. When you call they will tell you what you need. Find the SS office nearest you: https://secure.ssa.gov/ICON/main.jsp Why We Do It!Do what? Come to camp from out-of-state for the first time – with teenagers! I wanted you to know how much my family and I enjoyed our first trip to Latin American Heritage camp in June. My children are adopted from Guatemala, our son will be a freshman and our daughter will be an 8th grader. Both were a bit reluctant to attend, but after the first 24 hrs. at camp both were begging to attend next year. Camp created a dialog between us that we have not had before about adoption and also helped broaden our perspective, as parents. It gave us valuable insight and information about what our kids may be going thru. My daughter had a very rough 7th grade and is not looking forward to 8th and camp really helped her deal with some of her emotions. Both kids commented that is was great to be in such a large group of kids that were ‘just like them’. Having personally volunteered for may non-profit organizations I also have to compliment you on how well camp runs with so many volunteer positions. We were impressed with the offerings, organization and most of all the communication leading up to camp. Everyone was so welcoming and hospitable. It was a great experience that I have already recommended to many other adoptive families as well as to our attachment therapist for his clients to consider. We cannot wait to attend in 2017! Thank you for offering this excellent family camp, we are so glad we made the trip from Wisconsin to attend. – Tricia Bringing Camp Home!Yay for cooking classes at camp!! We made a Guatemalan feast from Amalia’s cookbook, “Amalia’s Guatemalan Kitchen” for our family Christmas dinner of 20 people, and everyone loved it. I proudly wore my apron I got at camp last year! It was so much fun to learn from Amalia herself at camp this last year! We even decorated the tables with Guatemalan fabric and used miniature worry dolls on place cards. The whole family pitched in, my girls were awesome helpers, it was very fun! I got the fabric for the table runners from an Etsy store called Spanglishfabrics. It was so easy to incorporate our daughter’s culture into our holiday celebration, because of what we all learned at camp! - Laurie |