When established in 2003, the Office of Refugee Resettlement’s (ORR) Division of Unaccompanied Children’s Services cared for roughly 6,000 children in thirteen facilities. Twenty years later, ORR’s program has grown to over 240 facilities and programs spread across 23 states. Global child migration is at an all-time high as more children flee extreme violence, corruption, forced gang conscription, social inequality, and the effects of climate change. As ORR’s program for unaccompanied children is expected to grow, Loyola University Chicago’s Center for the Human Rights of Children (CHRC) undertook an 18-month interdisciplinary study to examine the conditions of care for unaccompanied children in federal custody.
The study uniquely brings together socio-legal scholarship on children’s rights, migration studies, and child welfare in a comprehensive examination of the care of unaccompanied children in ORR custody. Enlisting a national survey with 135 respondents and 55 in-depth interviews with current stakeholders—including facility staff, clinicians, attorneys, and advocates—we identify ORR’s strengths and challenges in providing research-informed, culturally-, linguistically- and age- appropriate services to children in government custody.
To ensure a holistic evaluation of children’s needs—those needs essential to ensuring the well-being and proper development the child—researchers employed a comprehensive, internationally-recognized interdisciplinary tool: the Convention on the Rights of the Child. Using this framework, researchers identified distinct areas for evaluation, including the recognition of a child’s voice; measures for safety and protection; right to family unity; access to health care, legal services, education, recreation, and leisure; and the right to practice one’s religion, culture, and language. Researchers also evaluated these core areas with respect to the intersectional identities of young people, including for specialized populations such as Indigenous children, pregnant and parenting teens, children with disabilities, LGBTQIA+ children, and children aging out of ORR care. Finally, the study sought to identify policies and practices that shape children’s experience of ORR custody, including information sharing as well as staffing and training.
FINDINGS
Unsuitability of congregate care for children: Approximately 85% of children in ORR custody are placed in congregate care facilities—facilities that most commonly hold 50 to 200 children with some facilities holding up to 1,400 children. While the findings and recommendations contained in this document are designed to ameliorate the conditions of such care, it cannot go unnoted that ORR’s use of congregate care—a form of child detention—is contrary to the well-being, health, and development of migrant children.
Need to solicit and incorporate children’s wishes: Children in ORR custody have little opportunity to provide input on the conditions of their care. When asked if there are formal feedback mechanisms available to children, 45% of survey respondents indicated that they were unaware of any mechanisms for child feedback. 35% of respondents were aware of a comment box as the only feedback mechanism for children. In addition to conditions of care, the voice of the child is not routinely reflected in the family reunification process. Survey respondents indicated that 1 in 4 children do not have meaningful input in their family reunification. This trend appears across other areas including, importantly, decision-making related to the child’s medical and mental health care, preferred religious practices, and preferred cultural observances. Creating opportunities and processes that incorporate children’s wishes are central to providing trauma-responsive care and creating a safe space for children.
Inconsistent quality of care and monitoring across facilities. There is considerable variation in the conditions of care, access to services, and training of staff across facility types, sizes and locations. For example, in the provision of medical care, our findings indicated that ORR struggles with “less visible” medical and mental health needs such that 90% of survey respondents opined that children do not receive the highest standard of mental health care. These inconsistencies persisted across other areas of a child’s care, for example outdoor spaces for recreation and leisure vary considerably such that only 38% of survey respondents indicated that children regularly go outdoors to play. The variations also appear in education and the implementation of access to culture, language, and religion. For example, one participant shared, “we provide Muslim children time and space to pray, but transportation to a place of worship with an Imam is rare.” In contrast, in another facility, a participant explained, “children get a prayer rug but not a special place to pray.” These inconsistencies appear to result from limited or ambiguous policy guidance, variance in the interpretation of ORR policy, and limited supervision of facilities by ORR and state child-welfare licensing bodies. In fact, even in areas related to safety and protection, including reporting abuse, interviewees consistently shared that law enforcement and child welfare agencies may not respond to reports of abuse. The inconsistency of care is further exacerbated by high rates of staff turnover and burnout which create challenges in hiring and retaining a well-qualified and well-trained workforce.
Specialized populations of children are acutely impacted. Children’s social and political identities are multifaceted and intersectional, uniquely shaping how they experience ORR custody. Specific populations—namely Indigenous children, pregnant and parenting teens, children with disabilities, LGBTQIA+ youth, and children aging-out or aged-out of care— consistently do not receive the services to which they are entitled. The clearest example of this related to Indigenous children and the underutilization of interpretation services; when asked why language lines are not used or underutilized, staff described the inconvenience of scheduling telephonic interpreters when they can “get by” in Spanish. Similarly, we found that facilities struggle to provide specialized services to children with disabilities with many respondents reporting that facilities will “screen out” children with specialized needs rather than accepting the child with heightened needs into the placement. Our findings indicate that ORR facilities were unable to either promptly identify or fully address the needs of those with intersecting vulnerabilities including pregnancy, LGBTQIA+ identity, and disability. The full findings for each of these specialized populations are laid out in the report.
RECOMMENDATIONS
Congregate care should be a measure of last resort. In ORR facilities, children experience a loss of liberty, control and autonomy. Rather than expand facility capacity and size, ORR should emphasize kinship care and develop community-based placements, concordant with the domestic child welfare system. To the extent practicable, these placements should be made immediately following apprehension.
The U.S. Government’s approach to care and custody of children should be child-centered and research-informed. Instead, many current policies and practices are rooted in immigration law enforcement priorities. Drawing on a robust body of research, ORR should align its policies, procedures, and practices with research-informed, child welfare best practices. Throughout, ORR should implement mechanisms to enlist a child’s voice and expressed desires to inform decision-making impacting their care and release.
ORR must develop more consistent mechanisms for monitoring children’s experiences and quality of care across facilities, including in educational assessments and curriculum, recreation and leisure, religious and cultural practices, and access to interpreters.
Governmental agencies and contractors working with children require more robust interdisciplinary training and guidance, especially as it relates to specialized populations. Additionally, ORR staff and contractors need training on effectively working with children and with independent experts, including child development experts, physicians, country conditions and socio-cultural experts, and attorneys.