I was having a pretty interesting and sad conversation with my boss while we were at lunch the other day. We were just talking about this and that, when the conversation turned to some troubles he and his family have been experiencing. Boss was a foster father for a number of years, and ended up adopting his son. That actually happened about the time I was hired, which means the adoption took place about 10 years ago.

The little guy is not so little anymore. In fact, he is getting ready to go to college and has been looking at school. It is because of that, they learned that the son has an issue with his immigration. I did not realize that when a child is adopted, he or she is not automatically given American citizenship status through the course of the adoption. What is really scary is that I am not alone in my ignorance since my boss and the state Department of Children, Youth, and Families also seems to have been totally confused.

They have spent 3 years in the courts trying to formalize the son's citizenship. Apparently, the process is also different when the child is under 15. So when the son turned 15, they had to start the whole process of getting him American citizenship all over again. What is sad is technically, he would have lost all his access to the state health insurance program and other services provided for foster kids because of the state's error.

The son was actually living in the country with his mother at the time he entered the system. He was taken away from the mother because of neglect and abuse. I am not really sure what her legal status was, though, I do know that he has family on one of the Caribbean islands.

I just feel really bad. The poor kid was adopted 10 years ago after being in the foster care system for a number of years and now his college application is endangered because the state forgot to sort out his citizenship. Even once it is sorted out, he needs to get an education green card and wait a number of years before he can apply for actual citizenship.

Don't get me wrong. I understand that we have a process and a reason for it, but it seems like he is paying (in thousands of dollars as well as frustration) for the errors of someone else and a system that can't handle providing him the assistance he needs at a pace that is in anyway reasonable considering the details of the case.

I can see why people might decide to skip the system and come here illegally. Here is a family that is trying to do everything right and they are still not getting what they are due.