Helping Unaccompanied Refugee Youth

One of the objectives of our summer visits with ministries in Europe was to vet out the smartphone app that we had been hoping to develop with a goal of connecting unaccompanied youth with ministries that could help them along their travels. We achieved this, but with different results than we expected as we realized that this is not the timing for such an app.
Unfortunately, as many countries across Europe have closed their borders, movement between countries has dropped down to just a trickle in many areas. So, much of the work now must be focused on addressing the needs of those unaccompanied youth who continue to arrive on Italy’s shores and the other 200,000+ who are already somewhere across Europe. The good news is that the ministries we visited with are not having any challenges getting the word out about the services and programs they offer. Word of mouth it seems – whether directly or via What’sApp and Facebook – is still the best marketing tool around!

We are grateful for the time we had to explore this app project. It gave us the opportunity to build relationships with folks at Google that resulted in our connecting them with a friend in Parliament who helped them launch a jobs program. We also were invited into their London offices as consultants for the team that is working on that program as well as mentorships for unaccompanied youth. It also blessed us as we were introduced to the folks who developed the Love Europe app. We have met together several times and sense a synergy in our work. We will continue to meet with them to explore how God might lead us to work together to use technology to help refugee youth. We’ll keep you in the loop as that collaboration develops.