Tides Center, Young Center for Immigrant Children's Rights

The Young Center for Immigrant and Children’s Rights (“Young Center”), based at the University of Chicago Law School and a project of the Tides Center, was founded in 2004 to promote the best interests of unaccompanied immigrant children according to state, federal, and international law. With this renewal award, the Young Center facilitates the efforts of federal agencies to implement the recommendations of the Best Interests Framework developed with previous MacArthur support. Through trainings for judges, development of a case roadmap, and launch of a pilot review of selected cases (which may lead to discretionary relief from deportation in some instances), the Young Center buttresses agency actions to consider the best interests of the child during immigration removal (deportation) proceedings. These steps greatly diminish the possibility that unaccompanied immigrant children are repatriated into unsafe situations in their countries of origin.