Turning into a “Godparent”: How adult volunteers negotiate their personal life to become a mentor for “Unaccompanied Refugee Minors”

This article looks into how volunteers deal with their biographies and social embeddedness to make sense of their engagement in mentoring before they are matched. It draws on a qualitative investigation on a community-based pilot youth mentoring program for “unaccompanied refugee minors” in Austria. This article reveals how already trained, local adults actively relate to “family,”“migration” and “previous activities” in their meaning-making. It shows how they negotiate their personal life and existing relationships in the process of turning into a future “godparent.” The discussion of findings against the state of the art leads the way to two heuristic claims: firstly, the study provides grounded arguments for an extension of the conventional mentoring concept on the side of the mentor. Secondly, for a more relational and processual approach towards the mentors’ side, both biographical and social network dimensions need to be integrated in methods and designs of youth mentoring research.

What Do Social Workers Think About Unaccompanied Foreign Minors＇ Family Fostering in Italy

In Italy, the unaccompanied foreign minors are a growing and heterogeneous group with ever changing origins, trajectories, and features. In November 2015, they were 10,952. This research focuses on their foster care and examines the point of view of social workers that have theoretical competences and fieldwork. The main objective of this paper is to present operational recommendations concerning the definition and organization of this instrument, starting from social workers＇ direct experiences. Main results： A friendly familiar setting is useful to overcome loneliness and social isolation coming from a new and unknown realiW during adolescence and permit a better social, school, and professional integration for the minor compared with residential care. For a successful outcome, the strengths consist in： The young migrant must not have behavioral nor psychiatric disorders and must be willing to integrate himself into a new family, recognize adult authoriW and share his life plan with family＇s adults; training all foster families included omo-cultural ones; the birth family involvement in the foster care＇s project. The ascertained criticalities concern on the low number of available families, the lack of standard operating procedures, guidelines, research, and literature on the topic.

Research on the Present Situation and Nursing Care of the elderly in Shanghai

With the acceleration of the population aging in our country, the structure of the social family has gradually changed since the implementation of the family planning policy. The parents earliest birth in the only child family, has now gradually entered the old stage. While the family lost their children for a variety of reasons, is facing a serious economic, spiritual and other pension problems now.This paper starts from the analysis of the present situation of the unaccompanied elderly in Shanghai, attempting to find a path to solve the problem, and then proposes to explore the establishment of unsettled old-age security related supporting measures and policies.

Complex PTSD and Forced Migration of Children and Adolescents from Latin America

In order to provide culturally competent care to children and adolescents that have been subject to forced migration,clinicians must first understand the unique trauma these individuals experienced.Victims of forced migration frequently experience trauma pre-displacement,typically resulting from the same factors that led to the forced migration.They then often experience trau­ma during the migration itself and post-migration as they settle in a new environment,sometimes without their families if they are unaccompanied minors.An increased risk of developing complex PTSD(C-PTSD)correlates with the number of adverse childhood experiences(ACEs)such as those experienced by children and adolescents that experience forced migration.Understanding the nu­ances of these traumas and their specific manifestations for the individual child or adolescent is critical for effective behavioral health support.Trauma signature(TSIG)analysis offers clinicians a method to understand the relationship between traumatic events and the physical and psychological consequences to best support these victims.

Conflicts and Displacements in Syria: Exploring Life Trajectories of Separated Refugee Minors

This paper explores how unaccompanied refugee children from Syria made their way to destination countries and how they become unaccompanied and the consequences of being unaccompanied.This paper is based on interviews with Syrian child refugees in Turkey,Lebanon,Egypt and Jordan,and aid workers of international organizations who provide support with child refugees.The long-standing conflict has caused Syrian children to suffer immensely,both physically and psychologically.Data show that majority of the children became conflict orphan and left Syria.Some reported that they became separated or unaccompanied from their parents or relatives while crossing the border in the mass exodus.Some parents were arrested and killed in Syria by both the government and combatants.Some children were left alone by their relatives on the border in order to avoid violence in Syria,and some were smuggled into the destinations countries.