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From Howe High School through two Purdue degrees, Melitta Payne (SLHS '69, MS '70) has never strayed too far from her Indianapolis roots. As the coordinator of international services for Bethany Christian Services, however, Payne has helped bring adoptive families together with children from across the globe for nearly 30 years.
Payne, shown above during a 2010 visit to a child care center in South Korea, says her pull to the adoption field was a natural progression. "I was an adoptive mother of four — one through domestic adoption and three through international adoptions. I became very active in support groups with other adoptive parents. The agency eventually offered me a position as an adoption specialist."
That personal experience is critical in helping families navigate the environment of international adoption. But her education in speech, language, and hearing sciences is something she constantly relies on. "Purdue prepared me well for what I'm doing," Payne says. "As both an undergrad and graduate student I was exposed to a lot of child development and language development. With international adoptions, we know language is going to be a major adjustment for a child."
Earning an endorsement in learning disabilities, Payne says she also acquired supervision and counseling skills that she uses on a daily basis. Often placing children with special needs, she has continued her education through courses focusing on cleft palate, cerebral palsy, hearing loss and Down syndrome, allowing her to better prepare families for the children they're adopting.
Before joining Bethany Christian Services, Payne worked as a speech therapist in public schools. She also spent several years as part of a multidisciplinary team working with children with autism and developmental delays. Her role as a teacher and her love of lifelong learning have served her well both in educating families about adoption and in teaching fellow staffers.
Through her experiences, Payne has helped hundreds of families with international adoptions, which have changed significantly since she adopted three children from South Korea. In those days, an escort brought each child to Chicago. Now, adoptive parents are required to travel, allowing them to visit the birth countries of their children.
Though Payne has helped lead homeland tours to South Korea, she does not travel regularly. Instead, she considers herself an advocate for adoptive families. "I understand the questions and concerns the families have," she says. "I discovered in a very natural way how important it is to preserve and honor a child's birth heritage."
Purdue, she says proudly, played a pivotal role in her own career path. Her youngest child, Jonathan Payne (BS '05), even followed in her Boilermaker footsteps, earning an honors degree in economics from the Krannert School of Management before landing a job on Wall Street. "His Purdue education provided a wonderful foundation," she says.
Payne advises anyone who wants to parlay an education into both a career and a passion to be open to possibilities and learn from experience. "Every experience I've had has prepared me for something in the future," she says. "My children led me to my career."
