The Lutheran Immigration and Refugee Service (LIRS) has released a comprehensive set of policy recommendations for the care and protection of unaccompanied children in the United States. The report is called "At the Crossroads for Unaccompanied Migrant Children", and it was informed by a series of three national roundtable meetings convened in 2014 in which over a dozen immigration advocacy groups participated. “The meetings focused on the need for greater protection, accountability and cross-system collaboration around the welfare of unaccompanied children,” says the article. The report highlights the difficulties and failings of the current practices for apprehension and placement of unaccompanied children and focuses on the “need for all children to have post follow-up services such as home studies prior to reunification, and connecting children and their families with educational, legal, medical, and mental health services."
