Children on the Move
Efforts to respond appropriately to migrant and asylum-seeking children and families require innovative thinking and collaborative action. Young people who have lived the migration experience and those who have helped them navigate risk and find protection along the way must inform and guide the response.
People
Joan Lombardi
Center for Child and Human Development; Collaborative on Global Children's Issues
Senior Scholar; Senior Fellow
Featured
Read the Innovating Protection for Children on the Move Across the Americas Summary Brief
In spring 2022, Georgetown University's Collaborative on Global Children's Issues, the Georgetown Americas Institute, and the Institute for the Study of International Migration co-convened a series to bring a child-focused and solutions-oriented lens to the dynamic landscape of immigration between countries of origin and return, the U.S.-Mexico border, and within receiving communities across the United States.
Publications
Building Bridges for Every Child
February 1, 2021
This paper, co-authored by Gillian Huebner, executive director of the Collaborative on Global Children's Issues, was published by UNICEF and illustrates how reception, care, and services for unaccompanied migrant children in the United States can be built around the best interests of each child.
Events
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Children on the Move
There are more children on the move than ever before – fleeing violence, climate disasters, and poverty – and seeking safety and protection within and across borders. Currently, nearly 40 percent of the 100 million displaced persons worldwide are under the age of 18. However, the global discourse on…
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Blog Posts
Innovating Protection for Migrant and Asylum-Seeking Children in U.S. Communities
April 20, 2022
The number of young people fleeing high levels of violence, crime, natural disasters, food insecurity and poverty and crossing the U.S.-Mexico border reached a 20-year high in the U.S. government’s fiscal year 2021 (October 1, 2020 – September 30, 2021). This included a record number of children who…
Responses
Óyeme: In the United States
Joanne Seelig, Artistic Director of Education and Theatre for Change, Imagination Stage | April 25, 2022
In Their Own Words: In the United States
Identity, Theatre for Change | April 24, 2022
Innovating Protection for Children Along the Migratory Route and at the U.S.-Mexico Border
April 4, 2022
Children and families continue to travel between South and Central America, Mexico, and the United States in record numbers. Many experience abuse, exploitation, detention, deprivation, and discrimination along their migration journeys.
International law underscores that all children have a right to…
Responses
Proposal for the Protection of Children and Adolescents in Situations of Mobility
Pablo Aurelio Loredo Oyervidez, Monitoring and Evaluation Officer for the Americas, International Detention Coalition; Karen Valladares, Executive Director, National Forum for Migration in Honduras; María Eugenia Brizuela de Ávila, Former Minister of Foreign Affairs, El Salvador | April 20, 2022
In Their Own Words: The Journey
Identity, Theatre for Change | April 20, 2022
Videos
Children on the Move: Lived Experience Is Expertise (Video)
September 22, 2023
Duration: 1 hour 44 minutes
Children on the Move: How Does the United States Respond to Children on the Move? (Video)
September 22, 2023
Duration: 1 hour 9 minutes
Children on the Move: How Do Our Local Communities Respond to Children on the Move? (Video)
September 22, 2023
Duration: 1 hour 15 minutes
Georgetown Units
Institute for the Study of International Migration Georgetown Unit
Established in 1998, the Institute for the Study of International Migration is a research institute at the School of Foreign Service applying the best in social science, legal, and policy expertise to the complex and controversial issues raised by international migration.
Essays
Innovating Protection for Children on the Move across the Americas
"How did we manage to get here? We improvised. The safety we found—we created it ourselves." This is how a 16-year-old boy from Honduras summarized his journey across northern Central America and into the United States. "Now that I am here, I am still improvising.”
Hundreds of thousands of children…