March 2024

Already in its second week, our joint fundraiser with Al Otro Lado, Together and Free, Kids in Need of Defense, Justice in Motion and the National Immigration Project continues to raise money to ensure separated immigrant families can access consistent, free, high quality legal representation so they can file their asylum claims by December 2025. You can read more about this initiative in Mother Jones and  New York Magazine,

We are incredibly grateful to all of our supporters who have donated to this shared endeavor.  Immigrant families who are supported by an attorney are five times more likely to win their asylum cases than those without. There are hundreds of families who were separated under the Trump administration still seeking asylum and don’t have lawyers to help them. Help us cross the $3 Million finish line. Please note that donations received through this collaborative fundraising effort won’t go to the Young Center directly, but rather, will be pooled and allocated to our partners who can provide free, high quality legal representation to these families in their asylum cases.   

We're excited to announce that our Executive Director Gladis Molina Alt will give the University of Illinois Chicago’s Jane Addams College of Social Work  28th Karen J. Honig Memorial Lecture on Wednesday, March 13, 2024.

The discussion will focus on "Welcoming the Newcomer: Meeting Migration Trauma with Trust, Generosity, and Support." A reception will follow the lecture. All who are interested will need to RSVP before March 6. 

CONGRATULATIONS and FELICIDADES to our Child Advocate Program on appointing  Child Advocates to 1,049 new children and youth in this last year!

We exceeded our goal and are honored to advocate for the best interests of more than one thousand resilient children and youth.

Virgilio Aguilar Mendez, a 19-year-old Indigenous-Maya Mam teen  unjustly incarcerated since May 2023 for a crime he did not commit was released in Florida last Friday. Virgilio came to the U.S. as an unaccompanied child in April 2022 and was referred to our Child Advocate Program to receive support on his case. You can read more about his case here.

We are overjoyed by this news! Our deepest and most heartfelt congratulations to his legal representatives, the Guatemalan Mayan Center, his family,  his community, and all who advocated on his behalf and fought to ensure his release.  

Several of our offices are looking for Volunteer Child Advocates! A Child Advocate is an adult who volunteers to spend time with and advocate on behalf of an individual unaccompanied immigrant child while he or she is subject to deportation proceedings. 

Interested in signing up? We have volunteer opportunities coming up in Houston, Phoenix, Harlingen,  Chicago, and Los Angeles.

Looking to make a gift for unaccompanied and separated immigrant children? Show your support by donating here.

Young Center for Immigrant Children's Rights
2245 S. MICHIGAN AVE, SUITE 301,
Chicago, IL 60616
United States
www.theyoungcenter.org

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