Agencies Collaborate To Help Child Immigrants

Collaboration -- how social service agencies and non-profits can do it more effectively -- was the prevailing theme Thursday at a U.S. Immigration Services (USIS) and Department of Homeland Security (DHS) hosted training seminar aimed at helping to better protect endangered immigrant children. Georgia Division of Family Services employees, immigrant children advocates, social workers, community volunteers and others who work with immigrant children, came together for the three-hour session held at the U.S. Citizenship & Immigration Services offices near Northlake Mall. Organizers say the objective was to bring together representatives from local, state and federal agencies, along with non-profit organizations, to provide information and technical assistance. The goal was to inform staffers how to identify and assist abused documented and undocumented immigrant children who are victimized, neglected or abandoned. “It was an idea that was brought to us by DFACS (Department of Children And Family Services),” explains USIS District Director Denise Frazier.