My Hero is You 2021: How Kids Can Hope with COVID-19

Inter-Agency Standing Committee Reference Group on Mental Health and Psychosocial Support in Emergency Settings

The book aims to help children stay hopeful and positive during the COVID-19 pandemic. The story is a sequel to ‘My Hero is You: how kids can fight COVID-19!’, published in April 2020. 

Both books have been released by a collaboration of 60 organizations working in the humanitarian sector, including the World Health Organization, UNICEF, the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees, the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies and the MHPSS  Collaborative for Children & Families in Adversity.

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Family Engagement: Partnering With Families to Improve Child Welfare Outcomes

Child Welfare Information Gateway

Engaging families in the casework process promotes the safety, permanency, and well-being of children and families in the child welfare system and is central to successful practice. Effective family engagement occurs when child welfare practitioners actively collaborate and partner with the family network, including maternal and paternal relatives and fictive kin, throughout their involvement with the child welfare system and recognizing them as the experts on their respective situations. This bulletin for professionals provides an overview of the foundational elements of the family engagement approach, followed by strategies and promising practices for implementing it.

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¿Cómo hacer más efectiva la protección a la unidad familiar y la reunificación familiar en situaciones de movilidad humana y movimientos mixtos, y en contexto de pandemia?

Inter-American Commission on Human Rights (IACHR)

la Comisión Interamericana presenta la guía ¿Cómo hacer más
efectiva la protección a la unidad familiar y reunificar a la familia en los procedimientos migratorios y de protección en contexto de pandemia? en la que
se analizan los estándares interamericanos aplicables a la luz de las obligaciones
internacionales de los Estados y propone recomendaciones para garantizar la unidad
familiar y la reunificación familiar así como prevenir los riesgos de separación y minimizar los impactos en los casos de separación familiar. Asimismo, la implementación
de las garantías de la reunificación familiar requiere muchas veces de una estrategia idónea de acceso a mecanismos de regularización documental, así como de condiciones seguras de viaje y movilidad a través de las fronteras nacionales. Esto es especialmente benéfico para familias que se han visto separadas de manera forzada o por
razones asociadas a la movilidad humana.

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How Can Family Unit Protection and Family Reunification be Made More Effective in Situations of Human Mobility and Mixed Movements, and in the Context of the Pandemic?

Inter-American Commission on Human Rights (IACHR)

he Inter-American Commission on Human Rights (IACHR) has issued, in collaboration with the UN Refugee Agency (UNHCR), a practical guide on how to protect family unity and reunification more effectively in human mobility and mixed movement contexts during the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic. This publication is part of a series of guides issued by the IACHR to address the impact of the pandemic on human rights. The guide makes recommendations to States, so they may protect family unity, prevent separation, and take any necessary measures to ensure the reunification of families who may have been separated in contexts associated with human mobility.

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Global Minimum Estimates of Children Affected by COVID-19-Associated Orphanhood and Deaths of Caregivers: A Modelling Study

Lancet

Because most COVID-19 deaths occur among adults, not children, attention has been focused, understandably, on adults. However, a tragic consequence of high numbers of adult deaths is that high numbers of children might lose their parents and caregivers to COVID-19, as occurred during the HIV/AIDS, Ebola, and 1918 influenza epidemics. The goal of this report is to shine a bright light on this urgent and overlooked consequence that is harmful for children.

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COVID-19-Associated Orphanhood and Caregiver Death in the United States

Pediatrics Journal

This report captures overall and U.S. state-specific findings, disaggregated by race/ethnicity, for COVID-19-associated orphanhood and death of grandparent caregivers. High rates of orphanhood, marked disparities, and state-specific differences show the overlooked burden among children at greatest risk, in states most affected.

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Language that Cares: Changing the Way Professionals Talk About Children in Care

TACT

Language That Cares is a collaborative effort led by TACT that aims to change the language of the care system. Language is a powerful tool for communication but sometimes the way that it is used in social care creates stigma and barriers for understanding. Language is power, and we want children and young people to feel empowered in their care experience.

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Consequences of Exclusion: A Situation Report on Organisations of People with Disabilities and COVID-19 in Bangladesh, Nigeria, and Zimbabwe

International Disability Alliance (IDA)

The COVID-19 pandemic has exacerbated inequalities and barriers to
social inclusion for people with disabilities. These experiences of social
exclusion have been felt to an even greater extent by women with disabilities
and under-represented groups of people with disabilities, leading to a range of
effects on the operations and priorities of OPDs. To address a critical gap in the
evidence base, the Disability Inclusion Helpdesk carried out a rapid assessment
of the role of OPDs during the pandemic, and how the pandemic has affected
OPDs’ operations and priorities.

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Breaking the Silence on Special Needs Children in Foster Care: The Diversity of Children in Foster Care, Carers and Processes

Nuria Fuentes- Peláez, Carme Montserrat, Rosa Sitjes- Figueras, Gemma Crous

This study aims to advance the understanding of children with special needs in foster care by identifying the characteristics, processes, and outcomes of their placement. The study uses a quantitative approach to identify 190 children with special needs (registered) from among 2,157 foster children in Catalonia and the Balearic Islands, Spain and examines key data covering 2008 to 2018. The results show that children with special needs are overrepresented in placements with single-parent foster carers (mainly women), raising questions about the extent to which the care system takes the complexity of special needs into account.

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Promoting Resilience-Informed Care: A practical guidance resource for frontline workers in family based care

Changing the Way We Care

This practical guidance is for anyone working with children at risk of entering, already living in, preparing or having already left care. It discusses why and how to support children who are at risk of or who have already experienced adverse experiences that might lead to distress or trauma.

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Caseworker's Handbook: Case Management for Reintegration of Children into Family- or Community-Based Care

Changing the Way We Care

This Handbook is a summarized, simplified version of the Case Worker’s Guidebook for Case Management for Reintegration of Children/Young Adults into Family- or Community-Based Care. It provides an overview of the principles and practices of case management for reunification and placement of children/young adults outside of parental care (e.g., street-connected children/young adults or from Charitable Children’s Institutions and Statutory Children’s Institutions) into family- and community-based care, up until sustainable reintegration is achieved. The Handbook aims to provide an easy and quick reference to critical information and “how to” about case management for reintegration.

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Convocatoria para contribuciones: Informe del ACNUDH al Consejo de Derechos Humanos - “Los derechos del niño y la reunificación familial”

United Nations Human Rights Office of the High Commissioner

En la resolución 45/30, el Consejo de Derechos Humanos decidió centrar su próxima reunión anual de un día completo de los derechos del niño (2022) sobre el tema “los derechos del niño y la reunificación familial”. Además, solicitó a la Oficina del Alto Comisionado de las Naciones Unidas para los Derechos Humanos que prepare un informe sobre ese tema, en estrecha cooperación con todas las partes interesadas, con el fin de proporcionar información para la reunión anual de día completo.

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Appel à contributions: Rapport du HCDH au Conseil des droits de l'homme - "Les droits de l'enfant et le regroupement familial"

United Nations Human Rights Office of the High Commissioner

Dans sa résolution 45/30, le Conseil des droits de l'homme a décidé de consacrer son prochain débat annuel d’une journée complète sur les droits de l'enfant (2022) au thème « les droits de l'enfant et le regroupement familial ». Il a en outre prié au Haut-Commissariat des Nations Unies aux droits de l’homme d’établir un rapport sur ce thème, en étroite coopération avec toutes les parties concernées, afin d’éclairer le débat annuel d’une journée.

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Representing care experienced children & young people in police custody: A good practice guide

Fiona Dyer (Children & Young People’s Centre for Justice) and Irina Beaton (Scottish Child Law Centre)

The Children and Young People’s Centre for Justice (CYCJ), in collaboration with the Scottish Child Law Centre, has produced a resource to support Scottish solicitors and practitioners with Good Practice Principles when representing care experienced children in police custody, to ensure their rights are upheld.

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