It seems as if more accreditations are on the horizon.

European Adoption Consultants has a note on its Russia program page dated July 11, 2007 that says that it is expecting its accreditation "in the next few days". This would be quite interesting because EAC says on its Web site that it only submitted its accreditation papers to the Ministry of Education on March 6 of this year, well after some of the other agencies that are waiting for accreditation decrees.

There is nothing yet on EAC's accreditation on either the Web site that the Ministry of Education uses to post the license decrees (the most recent posting was July 9) or that of the U.S. Embassy in Moscow. But, as of this writing, it is only about 1 a.m. on Monday morning, so nobody is in the office yet there. (By the way, when you are looking on the MoE's Web site, look for notices that begin with "О разрешении на осуществление …". That's the way all the license decrees begin.)

None of the other agencies that are waiting for accreditation have anything similar to EAC's note on their Web sites. I had been hoping to see more glimmers of accreditation because there are rumors on the chat boards that another bunch is in the offing.

But I did notice something that struck me as odd when I was checking these Web sites: Several of them say that the particular agency is accredited, when in fact it is not.

Now I know that adoption agency staffs can be stretched thin, and maybe maintaining a Web site is not their top priority. Those notes I am sure refer to the agency's previous accreditation period, but in every one of the cases I found, the most recent accreditation had long since elapsed. Visiting a Web site is one of the first things that anyone does these days to gather information on anything, so there is a premium on up-to-date facts.

And all the back and forth to check and recheck status is making me wish there were a comprehensive database for adoption agencies the way there is for corporate information. When I was editing stories about General Electric, Microsoft and Ford, for example, I could quickly call up comparable information for all three.

How about a database for adoption agencies that lists name, address, NGO status, accreditation status, Council on Accreditation status, its membership in the Joint Council on International Children's Services, and the like?

UPDATE: EACI is confirming today, July 17, that it has gotten its accreditation. It's not on the MoE database yet; more details as I get them.