Fostering Across Borders

Support, improve and promote family-based care for unaccompanied migrant children in Austria, Belgium, Greece, Luxemburg, Poland and the United Kingdom

Duration: 15 January 2018 - 14 September 2019

During the surge in the arrival of refugees and migrants in Europe in 2015, more than 90,000 unaccompanied migrant children (UMCs) claimed asylum in Europe.

The majority of them were and still are placed in large scale residential care facilities despite the recommendation of the EU Agency for Fundamental Rights (FRA) to provide reception and accommodation of UMCs in foster care, since fewer children go missing from foster care in comparison to reception centres and institutions. Indeed at the beginning of 2016 Europol declared that 10,000 children were missing.

At the same time youth protection professionals  and other professionals working  with UMCs lack experience in dealing with this particular group of children and a large majority of them also lack training in preventing or responding to the disappearances of unaccompanied children.

Objectives

The project FAB aims to improve the quality of and expand the access to family-based care (FBC) for UMCs.

To achieve the objectives, the following activities will be implemented:

Mapping and analysis of current training materials for foster families as well as for staff of relevant institutions (national authorities, commissioned organizations, etc.) responsible for the recruitment, training and support of the foster families
Adaptation of training materials to meet the identified needs and to provide the necessary knowledge for the safe and effective care of UMC within families
Capacity building of relevant institutions through “trainings of trainers” on a variety of topics related to the challenges of foster care and of the integration process
Knowledge transfer by the institutions to the foster parents to support and accompany them, or to recruit new foster parents
Engage with UMC to ensure that the trainings contents, as well as foster care arrangements, meet their needs

Project deliverables

After the mapping and analysis of the training situation for foster families and for staff of relevant institutions, the following reports have been produced:

• A mapping report of existing training for family-based care providers for UMC in Austria;
• A mapping report of existing training for professionals in Austria;
• A training handbook for training (prospective) foster carers for unaccompanied migrant children
• A video: Unaccompanied migrant children film their stories;
• An information brochure on fostering unaccompanied migrant children;
• Information brochures on selected countries of origin of unaccompanied migrant children;
• A final report with key learnings and recommendations.

Further information

Fostering Across Borders Website

Contact points in Austria for prospective foster parents

A different kind of family addition: A story of foster care (in German)

Contact

IOM Austria, Integration Unit

integrationvienna@iom.int

+43 (0)1 585 33 22 / 24, 14 or 19

This project is funded by the European Union's Right, Equality and Citizenship Programme (2014-2020).