LAYC Awarded Grant to Provide Services to Unaccompanied Children
We are thrilled to announce that we have been approved to launch a new program to support unaccompanied migrant children arriving to the DC and Maryland region. The Esperanza Program will provide approximately 160-190 children each year with comprehensive services as they transition to life in new homes in the region.
The Esperanza Program has two primary goals:
Providing safe, structured transitional foster care housing while unaccompanied children wait decisions on immigration statuses and release to sponsors; and
Offering wrap-around services during their time in transitional foster care.
The program will be equipped with staff trained in case management, clinical care, English language (ESL) education, trauma-informed care, and program assessment services to ensure continuity and progress for each individual youth. Furthermore, our Positive Youth Development approach offers the youth participants the opportunity to provide input into the program so we can ensure that their strengths, futures, and values are a top priority.
The grant was awarded by Office of Refugee Resettlement (ORR) within the Administration for Children and Families (ACF), an operational division of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS). Our capacity to deliver the Esperanza Program is based on over 25 years of experience providing housing and related support services to runaway and homeless youth (RHY) youth, transitional and long-term foster care youth, youth who identify as LGBTQ, and low-income youth from diverse ethnic, racial, and national backgrounds.
As some states callously reject unaccompanied children in desperate need of support, LAYC is positioned to be a leader in aiding this vulnerable population. We are the only child placement agency in DC licensed to recruit and train Spanish-speaking foster parents and, in May 2022, we received our license to be a child placement agency in Maryland.
We will keep the community informed as the program prepares for launch in early 2023.
