Adoption vs. In-country Help - Case in Point

I just read a sad post.  A mildly handicapped older child who was warmly advocated for, who had asked for a family, has decided firmly against being adopted.  A family which had sprung into action, turning their lives around to go halfway around the world, spending and raising thousands of dollars to rescue him from a potentially miserable future, is going home alone.

Just after I have posted about the question of adoption vs. helping orphans where they are, this story brings that very question into sharp relief.  After considering his options, this 15-year-old boy feels he would rather go to a trade school and struggle through life in his own culture than start from scratch in an adoptive family in the U.S.  The parents reflect,


He will go to trade school (he says -- but I don't think he's thought about how to pay for that...) and become a cook.

 Well, how would he pay for it?  Good question!  If the people who have been handling this situation from the beginning thought out of the box about the best interest of the boy, instead of relying on a "one size fits all" solution, perhaps the money that was raised and spent in the cause of this adoption could have been used for a scholarship fund for teenaged orphans.  There is more than one way to "care for orphans in their distress".  There are times that adoption is the best, or even the only way.  There are other times when it is not.

I feel very sad for the family.  I don't think anyone did anything "wrong".  This just highlights the stakes involved in the question I asked:


How do you decide how to spend your charity money (and time and effort)?