Lumos is the organization founded by J.K. Rowling that campaigns to end the institutionalization of children.
Rowling helped establish the Children’s High Level Group in 2005 after seeing a newspaper photograph of children living in institutions. The organization later became Lumos, named after the light-producing spell in the Harry Potter books. Its work focuses on replacing large residential institutions with family- and community-based care.
The charity works internationally on child protection, family support and social-care reform. Its central argument is that children generally develop better when they can grow up in safe families or suitable community settings rather than being permanently separated into institutions.
Lumos is not a fictional Hogwarts group or a general Rowling literary foundation. It is a real charitable organization, and its name is a direct reference to the fictional wand-lighting spell “Lumos.”