Caring for Unaccompanied Children

Bobbie Gregg, Deputy Director, Office of Refugee Resettlement

Every day children make a dangerous journey from Central America to the United States, often in the hands of human smugglers, in search of a better life. These children are often fleeing violence and coming to be reunited with a parent or close family member.  

Two years ago this month, we marked the height of the 2014 influx of children, when children were crossing the border in numbers that exceeded our capacity to provide care at an Office of Refugee Resettlement (ORR) shelter. By law ORR is responsible for providing care to children referred by immigration authorities until the children are placed with an adult family member or responsible adult sponsor.

In the past two years, our program has evolved. We are better prepared for the fluctuation in the numbers of children who are referred to our care. We’ve also made significant improvements to our overall operations, from building a medical team to adding more accountability for our shelters to increasing our security protocols to help ensure that a child’s placement after they leave our care is safe.

Even while we have expanded, adjusted, and improved, the core of our mission remains the same: caring for children under age 18 who come into the United States without a parent or legal guardian.

For each unaccompanied child, we provide a safe and healthy environment in one of approximately 100 state licensed shelters in 12 states. All of our shelters ensure each child has access to nutritious food, clean clothes, education, medical services, clinical services, case management and access to legal service providers.

We also have temporary shelters that are part of our ability to shelter children. Temporary shelters allow us increase the number of beds we have available as needed, instead of paying for them all year.

Right now, we have a temporary shelter open in Homestead, Florida at a former Job Corps campus. The shelter, even though it is temporary in nature, is offering the same services as those offered at our permanent shelters: nutritious food, classroom education, recreational opportunities, mental health clinicians, medical personnel, and case managers.

Over the past two years, we’ve expanded our shelter network to become better able to respond when we need more space. We’re proud of the network, and in particular, of our ability to bring online temporary shelters like the Homestead Shelter.

We’ve fine-tuned our operation over the last two years to better care for unaccompanied children and we are committed to our ongoing efforts to strengthen this program to serve this vulnerable population.

Learn more about the Office of Refugee Resettlement