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What nationality is my child?

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chamaflauge

Ranter

Joined: Nov 28, 2007
Posts: 558

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Posted: July 25, 2009 - 01:23 PM
Post subject: What nationality is my child?

I'm American and my wife is Chinese. We will have a child. Is my baby an American or Chinese? Is our baby allowed to leave China to go to America? Seems like an easy question but I haave been reading a lot of contradictory statements(not from this website). What rights does our baby have as far mainly as education? Thanks

[moved to a sticky by Moderator because MANY parents and parents-to-be ask this question]

gokim19

Squeeker

Joined: Jan 28, 2009
Posts: 15

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Posted: July 25, 2009 - 03:10 PM

since you're US citizen your child will be US citizen. I dont think they allow dual chinese/american citizenships so your child will have easy time staying in america than in china.

chunki

Barker

Joined: May 13, 2005
Posts: 178

Status: Offline

Posted: July 25, 2009 - 03:32 PM

China doesn't allow dual nationality, so you'll have to choose one or the other for your child. It's difficult, but not entirely possible to have both. I know of people who manage it by traveling to a third country every time they fly somewhere and then swapping passports when they reach the third country.

You can't swap passports in mid-air. It's a lot of trouble because it means that whenever your child travels, he/she has to apply for a travel visa for that third country in his/her Chinese passport. Also, if your child has a Chinese passport it means you can't have any more children in China.

Without a Chinese passport, your child won't have any rights to state education in China, but unless you want your child spouting Chairman Mao and doing no sport, it's unlikely you would want that anyway.

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Misteral

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Joined: July 24, 2008
Posts: 459

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Posted: July 25, 2009 - 03:42 PM

Either register your child at an American consulate and apply for a US passport or register him/her with the relevant Chinese authority as a Chinese citizen. Almost impossible to have dual nationality with China. If you choose Chinese any subsequent children you have will be American, unless you go through the rigmarole of changing the nationality of the first born from Chinese to American.

chamaflauge

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Joined: Nov 28, 2007
Posts: 558

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Posted: July 25, 2009 - 06:32 PM

So what can be suggested should I allow my child to be a Chinese citizen? We don't make expat money but I want a good education also. I'm just a little frightened of the Chinese education system

leidelaohu

Board Lord

Joined: June 11, 2007
Posts: 5751

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Posted: July 25, 2009 - 07:35 PM

chamaflauge wrote:

So what can be suggested should I allow my child to be a Chinese citizen? We don't make expat money but I want a good education also. I'm just a little frightened of the Chinese education system

Camo, you should think about this. You know what it's like to grow up black in the US. How do you think it would be to grow up half-black in Shanghai ? And you really want a purse-carrying pansy son who can't think ? Before he's two you gotta get out of here to somewhere he or she can grow up to be a human being.

DrShanghai

Reacher

Joined: Nov 06, 2005
Posts: 318

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Posted: July 25, 2009 - 07:38 PM

No brainer go for US Citizenship, If your wife is Chinese you can get all kind of special visas for Him/Her. We have a new one coming in August. PM me I will share with you everything I have found out .

tingbudong

Lurker

Joined: May 21, 2008
Posts: 22
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Posted: July 25, 2009 - 09:08 PM

Quote:

No brainer go for US Citizenship

Yeah, no kidding. A previous poster mentioned spouting Chairman Mao...it actually has an official term "Patriotic Education" and consists largely of bashing Western countries for actions committed against China over a century ago.

Personally, I would never place a child into that...certainly not my own, regardless of the 'mandarin-learning' experience. I would scrape together the funding for an international school or leave China.

Rumpelstiltskin

PopStar

Joined: May 13, 2009
Posts: 1293

Status: Offline

Posted: July 25, 2009 - 10:09 PM

Damn the time passes so quickly. Seems like yesterday when Chamu was crying he can not find a girlfriend now he is already talking children...

victorinchina

Board Royalty

Joined: Jan 17, 2009
Posts: 7075
Location: Shanghai
Status: Offline

Posted: July 25, 2009 - 10:52 PM

^ Wifey was obviously out of town at that time.... you know what that means Cool

@OP. As others say, go for the US citizenship, round up money for an international school or get out of here before the kid turns 2-3 years old...

endyjai

Newbie

Joined: June 26, 2009
Posts: 6

Status: Offline

Posted: July 25, 2009 - 10:57 PM

Surely part of your child's education is what you pass down to them? If your kid is easily manipulated at school then isn't also your 'fault' for not influencing them with your philosophies?

Who here just took what they were given at school as doctrine? The Chinese schools must have an amazing brainwashing programme.

Misteral

Raver

Joined: July 24, 2008
Posts: 459

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Posted: July 25, 2009 - 11:13 PM

Quote:

@OP. As others say, go for the US citizenship, round up money for an international school or get out of here before the kid turns 2-3 years old...

Don't think you have to worry about leaving until the kid is 5-6 years old. Send him/her to a local kindy until primary school age then either spend any cash you have on an international school (about RMB12K a month minimum for a half decent one) or get the hell outta here. I've got two years left before we plan to move.............. Crying or Very sad

DrShanghai

Reacher

Joined: Nov 06, 2005
Posts: 318

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Posted: July 25, 2009 - 11:16 PM

boy did we get off topic!

endyjai

Newbie

Joined: June 26, 2009
Posts: 6

Status: Offline

Posted: July 26, 2009 - 01:07 AM

If everyone is so worried about having their kids conditioned why not go to Hong Kong?

chamaflauge

Ranter

Joined: Nov 28, 2007
Posts: 558

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Posted: July 26, 2009 - 09:06 AM

12K a month? I heard SMIC cost 4000 usd a year, and its pretty much an international school. Whats your take on it?

Misteral

Raver

Joined: July 24, 2008
Posts: 459

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Posted: July 26, 2009 - 10:10 AM

chamaflauge wrote:

12K a month? I heard SMIC cost 4000 usd a year, and its pretty much an international school. Whats your take on it?

SMIC fees per semester for the English Track. (No idea how long a semester is but at least two of them per year, maybe even three )

31,750 Elementary school
37,050 Middle school
39,050 High school

Neville_Bartos
Barker
Barker

Joined: July 22, 2009
Posts: 197
Location: Behind you

Posted: July 26, 2009 - 08:53 PM

endyjai wrote:

The family has a massive influence over a child's upbringing but the pressure of the society can also never been underestimated.
I have worked in the local government schools here in China and they are awful. Factual, rote based memorisation dribble that is not an education but more a dull, boring, forced prison sentence that churns out drones who have no ability to think for themselves because their government tells them they are there for them when in actual fact they couldn't give a stuff about them but do the people realise this, of course not.

I feel deeply sorry for the Chinese people who are let down by a shocking education system that is not allowing them to become internationally aware which is what is needed in an increasing globalised world.

catur

Reacher

Joined: Feb 16, 2005
Posts: 231

Status: Offline

Posted: July 26, 2009 - 11:58 PM

Misteral wrote:

chamaflauge wrote:

12K a month? I heard SMIC cost 4000 usd a year, and its pretty much an international school. Whats your take on it?

SMIC fees per semester for the English Track. (No idea how long a semester is but at least two of them per year, maybe even three )

31,750 Elementary school
37,050 Middle school
39,050 High school

There are 2 semesters per year. Tuition doesn't includes books or transportation. It's a good school, my 2 go there. For international, this is about as cheap as it gets. Agree with everyone else, of course US citizenship, and start saving now for when your child turns 6.

keitho

Newbie

Joined: Apr 24, 2004
Posts: 6

Status: Offline

Posted: July 27, 2009 - 12:45 AM

I am American and my wife is Chinese and we just had a son born in Shanghai in June. Here is the process that we were told to follow to claim citizenship and get a passport. We decided to go for US citizenship for him. I have not even considered the implication on his schooling since we will probably go back to the US when he is 2 or 3 years old.

Some of these steps need some different supporting evidence. So it is best to research the whole thing now so that you can start to gather it. We are planning a trip back to the US this fall so I was in a hurry to get all of this done. We are just finishing up step 2 now so it looks like we will be able to make our trip in September.

1. Register the birth and apply for a passport at the US consulate. You will need to make an appointment for this and there was about a 1 week wait for an appointment in June. I wont write here what you need because the Shanghai consulate's webpage is very throrough for this. We spent about 1 hour at the consulate to apply for this and it took only about 2 weeks to get the passport back after our appointment. No need to pay extra for rushing the passport through.

Good luck getting some passport pictures of your baby. I put him down on a white sheet when he was about 1 week old when he was awake and alert one night and took about 200 pictures of him with a fast lens. Only about 2 or 3 turned out anywhere close to meeting the picture requirements. So I took those to the local Kodak shop and they made me 10 passport pictures for 50 rmb.

2. Go to the Shanghai Exit/Entry Bureau ( address:
No 1500 Min Sheng Road) to take the "nationality test" and apply for an "emigration paper"

You will need the following documents:
Original Birth Certificate
Original US passport of baby
Your original US Passport
Your Wife's Original Chinese Citizen ID Card & 户口本 (residence book)
2 piece of 2-inch photos
Marriage book or certificate

You will first go upstairs and take the nationality test. This will just be your wife talking to a guy and him looking at some documentation and filling out a form for you. Then you will take this form downstairs and apply for the emigration paper. This whole process took only about 1 hour and then they asked us to come back in about 2 weeks to pick up the emigration paper. This whole process if free but they will ask you for a lot of copies of everything listed above so you can either bring 2 or 3 copies of everything with you or make them there for 0.5 rmb each.

3. Travel to oversea with the " emigration paper"

4. Apply for a single entry tourist visa for baby.

5. Enter China with the US Passport and tourist visa

6. Apply for a "The Registration of temporary residence " within 24 hours at local PSB of arrival

7. Apply for the residence visa for the US Passport

chamaflauge

Ranter

Joined: Nov 28, 2007
Posts: 558

Status: Offline

Posted: July 27, 2009 - 01:02 PM

Thanks for some of the info Keith. It seems i was misinformed about SMIC but 38'000 yuan is way better than those other schools. The good ol' U S of A I remember it was free. Kids education becoming a profitable institution now.

leidelaohu

Board Lord

Joined: June 11, 2007
Posts: 5751

Status: Offline

Posted: July 27, 2009 - 03:35 PM

chamaflauge wrote:

The good ol' U S of A I remember it was free.

Not quite. Public education in the USA is paid for by property taxes. In some ways we are more socialist than China Very Happy

hundan

Lurker

Joined: May 08, 2008
Posts: 25

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Posted: July 27, 2009 - 08:58 PM

[useless comment deleted]

endyjai

Newbie

Joined: June 26, 2009
Posts: 6

Status: Offline

Posted: July 27, 2009 - 11:26 PM

Neville_Bartos wrote:

endyjai wrote:

Doesn't sound any different than the schools here that just give you a list of things to learn to pass exams. But I think I kinda see your point. We just have to hope that our children are uber sharp and smart. Didn't Ghandi say that the wise don't have to be taught?

Soldano

Talker

Joined: July 29, 2009
Posts: 116

Status: Offline

Posted: Aug 03, 2009 - 04:06 PM

Actually when i was witth my CHinese girlfriend, we direclty compared a school book from france with a chinese one. It didn't take her long to realise the difference, eventually she started to get really into the french history book, which has a lot of articles, pictures, letters, documents and is oriented towards developping a personal point of view through dissertations and documents analisis, two concepts that do NOT exist in china. Here it's learn by heart, don't think.

She said that she never wants her kid to go to school in China, and Chinese children really look like clones, which is scary now that she realises it.

That's just the way it is, if you want to give your children better education, China is definitely not the place, and will probably never be. USA is not the best place for junior schools, but it's still one of the good ones, it's a no brainer.

About the nationality, again it's notvery complicated : US nationals are much likely to get a Chinese Visa than Chinese Citizens an American Visa BY FAR. Just going back to the US for Xmas might be a nightmare. Don't forget to ask your wife about it.

And whatever you do, do NEVER let the Chinese grandparents take care of the child, that's the worse you could do.