Daegu’s Nam-gu district is moving to establish what it says will be the city’s first council focused on supporting children and young adults preparing to leave care. The district held talks with leaders of child-care institutions and group homes to design a more integrated model based on the needs of young people approaching independence.
The plan is intended to connect services that are often handled separately, including employment, housing, finance, legal assistance and psychological support. Local officials said the initiative responds to concerns from care providers that young people leaving protection can face a much more difficult starting point than peers who continue to receive family support after reaching adulthood.
Creating a council does not by itself solve gaps in housing, jobs or long-term mentoring, but it can give agencies a shared structure for identifying problems before support ends. The important measure will be whether individual care leavers receive coordinated plans rather than being referred from one program to another. Nam-gu’s model may also offer a test for whether similar coordination should be expanded elsewhere in Daegu.