Acompañando-T: Supporting UAM's transition to adulthood in Spain

Description of best practice:

The project Acompananda-T is based on working on the transition to adult life of Unaccompanied Foreign Youth who have left the Child Protection Systems. In order to achieve the foreseen objectives, we have worked in three different areas:
1. Residential resource where these young people take care of the usual expenses of renting a house, its maintenance and generate positive relationships with the neighborhood.
2. Employment-oriented training with unpaid internships in strategic sectors with high demand for recruitment: namely hospitality and tourism.
3. We provide the project with individualized support to respond to the diverse needs of young people such as: information about their legal and administrative situation, bureaucratic processes, intermediation, conflict resolution and emotional support, among others.

Target group:

The beneficiaries of this project have been 15 unaccompanied young people, 10 establishments where these young people have carried out their internships, several social organizations where they have volunteered and, indirectly, the citizens of Pamplona and Puente La Reina.

Why is this in your view a best practice that others should follow?

Our foundation developed a pioneering and pilot project that comprehensively addressed the needs of these young people and which has allowed the Government of Navarre to take inspiration for the implementation of a project with this group of beneficiaries.

Given the administrative legal situation that makes it impossible for them to access employment, unpaid internships in the hotel and tourism sector have allowed these young people to demonstrate their skills in an ordinary job and this has had a positive impact on employment (achieving a 70% recruitment rate), enabling them to regularize their situation in the country.
80% of people have been regularized or are in the process of regularization through social roots or through the reform of the immigration law.

Methods & results

Target group:

Young Unaccompanied Foreigners aged 18 to 25 in an irregular situation.

Aim/issue:

Improving transition to adulthood of unaccompanied foreign youth.

Parties involved:

15 unacompanied minors, 10 establishments, public administration of Pamplona, Puente la Reina and the Government of Navarre, social organizations, volunteers through social mentoring, the technical team of the Koine Foundation and, therefore, other unaccompanied youth who create informal networks.

Context:

In Spain the population of unaccompanied migrant minors is currently increasing, usually from the Maghreb and sub-Saharan Africa. Once they reach the age of majority, they leave the child protection system, becoming homeless and at high risk of social exclusion.

Elaborate description of implementation of practice:

Phase 1

1. Meetings with entities of the child protection systems and other organizations that may be interested.
2. Interviews with young people who would like to participate.
3. Agreements with real estate agencies to obtain a residential resource.

Phase 2

1. Accompaniment to recognise the needs of the selected young people.
2. Specific training in transversal competences for the acquisition of personal and professional skills.
3. Theoretical-practical training in tourism and hotel management

Phase 3

1. Unpaid internships in hotel and tourism establishments.
2. Identification of volunteers for the implementation of a Social Mentoring program.
3. Processing and monitoring of the regularization processes of the young people.

Phase 4

1. Project monitoring and evaluation

Challenges, risks:

The challenges we have faced are:
- Young people dropping out for various reasons.
- Failure to get a job offer once they have finished their internships.
- Difficulties in obtaining documentation from their country of origin.
- Delays and slowing down of bureaucratic processes for regularization.

Results:

For the regularization of 10 young people through the social roots and the transitional law as former minors. Carrying out unpaid internships in establishments facilitated access to the labour market. Raising awareness and recognition of the reality of unaccompanied foreign young people.
Previously, it was difficult to find companies that would take on young foreigners without having met them beforehand, in order to give them a one-year full-time contract. We believe that the key to the success of this project is that the establishments have been able to take on young people they already know because they have done internships in their establishment.

Preconditions

Location and means:

To fully realize this project, housing resources are required to be able to support their basic needs, as well as human resources for accompaniment. Spaces for the realization of the theoretical and practical training.

Who works on the project:

This project is led by the Koine Aequalitas Foundation with the support and funding of the CAN Foundation, Pamplona City Council and the Government of Navarre.

Costs:

This project has a biannual character. More than €100.000 is budgeted, where the biggest percentage of the budget resides in human resources (social workers, trainers, sociologists etc.). The expenditure produced in housing resources with its usual expenses such as electricity, water etc. comes secondly.