By Subhrata Jena | Project Contributor
Executive Summary
YCDA has initiated Alternatives form of Child Care programme with the key focus on care and protection through community based rehabilitation and family focused alternative care to ensure best interest of the child since 2007 in Boudh and Bolangir district in the partnership of SKN, The Netherlands. In addition to this, for the proper implementation of the programme YCDA now is supporting the children with small individual donation. YCDA plays a pioneer role in promoting non-institutional care in the State like Orissa through community centric child care like Kinship Care, Foster Care, Group Foster Care and Child headed household as its outstanding innovative.
Foster care provides a temporary, safe, stable and nurturing family life experience for a child when the child’s family is unable to provide. Foster care is based on the belief that a family and community is the most beneficial and desirable environment for the healthy growth and development of a child. The goal of the foster care system is to ensure that a child can be safe, secure and well cared for while a family is in crisis. The intended result is that the child grows up in a safe, stable and permanent home. The first priority is to work with the child’s family so they can provide safety and permanence for their child. This work occurs while the child is in foster care.
Placing a child in foster care gives the child a safe place to grow, either until the family circumstances improve enough to reunite the child with the parents or till a permanent rehabilitation is done for the child. Children are usually sent to foster care when they are deprived of family care due to various reasons
Our guiding Principles:
The two most important attempts such as UNCRC, ICPS serves as a guideline principle for promoting the concept. United Nation Convention on the Rights to the children states that in order to be able to develop his or her personality fully and harmoniously, a child should grow up in a family environment in an atmosphere of happiness, love and understanding .The integrated Child Protection scheme in its guiding principle mention that institutionalization of children have to be the last resort as there is a need to shift the focus of interventions.
YCDA Foster Care Programme :
Foster Care is a family based non-institutional child care programme that provides temporary/substitute care for children in difficult circumstances, for example children whose parents are unable to care for them due to illness, death, desertion of one parent or any emotional crisis.
A family focused, community based approach to foster care is the basis on which we can build a fully responsive service system. Foster care can provide a safety net to families in crisis. A foster care looks to the future, community partners will be critical to the goal of providing children with temporary care on their way to permanency with the family.
Foster Family care provides a child with its basic needs of Love, affection and undivided attention. A foster home satisfies a child’s essential need for a mother. The shower of attention and care that the child gets from foster family helps preserve a child’s innocence.
OUR STATERGY:
Delivering direct services, building capacity of all the stakeholders and making lobby and advocacy at the Micro and Macro level are our underlying strategies through which we have already transformed lives of many children and condition of families. Our aim has been to create poverty and vulnerability proof environment, and make the children combat-ready for any type of situation. We just want to rescue them from a poverty-ridden condition and enable them to customize themselves as per the changing situation as we believe in the adage “survival of the fittest” .
To ensure the safe childhood, continue their education and ensuring all-round developments of the children. During the period we have supported 100 children who are living without parental care and stated intervention with small individual donation and existing project support.
Our Support System:
Need Based Support
This aims to provide basic needs of survival, development for holistic development of a child. Beginning of the year team assess the need of the children and accordingly need based support is provided. Major focus of project remained on mainstreaming dropouts in formal school and completion of formal schooling. This support has changed life of children.
Ensure that education systems recognise the particular vulnerabilities of children in kinship care and are able to offer adequate support for schooling, psychosocial support and protection.
Health Support
Two times in a year Regular check-up of all supported children is done .Immediate health problems of the vulnerable are addressed and special cases are taken care of.
Counselling support
Regular follow up and counselling support is provided to children. Counselling support aims to provide moral and professional support to overcome depression, trauma
Family strengthening support
The Family Strengthening Program involves not just parents or children alone, but the whole family. The families are also linked through different govt. schemes & provisions .Household economic strengthening aims to reduce a family's vulnerability to poverty, increase economic independence, and improve people's ability to provide for their children. As a result children are getting more care and support from caregivers.
Impact of the Programme :
Key intervention During the Period:
Follow up/Family Visit:
Many activities being carried out for the benefit of children, follow-up visit is one which is a must to ensure that the provided services are at last having desired effect on children and their caregivers. Such visits help us in keeping track of child’s health, education, participation and protection aspects. It reveals the gaps in providing required support to the children and helps us design interventions to meet their changing needs. It also ensures whether a particular child is enjoying his/her childhood or not. Through this strategy each and every child is monitored within three months’ time without fail. In case any deviation is found, a plan of action is prepared to set that deviation right. During the visit we focus on intensive counselling to children and their caregivers as that will enhance their knowledge level and in the long run that knowledge will empower them to stand on their own leg. It has been marked that counselling has an effective impact through which we have addressed many issues like early marriage, dropout, abuse, torture, neglect , exploitation with the help of community people and in days to come we will continue to crush all issues that will try to block the development path.
Children Accessing Education:
Children’s education is said to be of great importance as it is the escalator to take them to success. YCDA’s specific focus is on education as it has tremendous ability to transform a child’s life. Without education, a child’s life is baseless and hence education of children is a must and mandatory. After matriculation we are preparing their career plans so that they will go in a direction which will improve their skills and enable them to earn a living in the long run. We have been preparing career plan keeping in view the varied skill and ability of children. Those who want to go for higher studies; we are facilitating the entire process; even we are providing them admission fees as well.
During the period, 16 children have been admitted to get higher study and technical education support.The social worker supervised their academic progress records and discusses with the parents and teachers. All the 100 children are going to school, colleges and tuitions regularly. All the 100 children are supported by reading & writing materials with tuition fees.
Need based support to children :
YCDA’s aim is to change the lives of children and bring smile on their faces and it has been resorting to various means to accomplish this goal. Through different methods it has been trying to trace out the needs of the children and according to those findings, it has been preparing the plan of providing required services like admission fees, career guidance, tuition fees, food packets, footwear, clothes and study materials. 100 children have already availed such benefits and there has been significant transformation in their lives. Prior to this initiative, children who were talented were not able to go farther in education field due to financial crisis, but now things have totally changed. Children are no more deprived of studies and in addition to that their parent’s burden of education expenditure has been lessened to a great extent. Needless to say that such help of ours has paved children’s path of education and rescued them from an uncertain future. 100 children’s health, education and development needs have been met during the period.
Provide Counseling support to the children:
Psychosocial support helps vulnerable children and their caregivers to cope with mental and emotional challenges. Primary areas of focus of those providing psychosocial support have included: Recreational activities, Training & Counseling, therefore, is one of the approaches to providing psychosocial support to orphans and other vulnerable children. Counseling is process which helps children to help themselves, recognize their strengths, and identify the resources available to help them overcome problems and make healthy decisions. It is a process that involves them listening to a child’s problems and building the child’s resilience and coping skills. It requires the counselor to create a supportive environment .The child is allowed to tell their own story without fear of judgment or interrogation, in a safe reassuring environment.
During the period, our social workers primarily have focused on the counseling to the children living with stress and grief. Based on the assessment and monitoring visit both the care givers and foster children could have got the psycho social counseling support by the special counselors. Normally children undergone in depression don’t get much attention toward their education and development, so to address this above issue the frequent counseling and life skill training is provided and the above issues are resolved by the experts.
Children Camps:
Children camps have been resulted to enhance the participation of the children and make them efficient for leadership quality & confidence to participate actively. It also enhances the involvement of teachers. Children could participate to share their views and difficulties they get in regular basis. The teachers were also actively involved and carried on the whole process of the camp.
YCDA creates a small initiative of this camp to create a child friendly learning atmosphere where children learn, play, enjoy their life. Enabling children to realize their inherent potentials, children camps were organized for the children age group of 9 to 15 years. During the period, Children camp have been organized in both the Boudh & Bolangir districts where around 500 School children including 100 foster children came together to a platform, shared their views on their issues and participated in different competitions like role play, Debate, drawing, singing, quiz; preparing clay model & creative writing to expose their potentiality . The children gain knowledge; skills on four rights, responsibilities. Prizes have been given to children who performed better in the competition.
Family Strengthening:
So far the Family Strengthening is concerned the economic condition plays a great role in providing better care & protection to the children in the long run. In maximum cases it is marked that children are neglected and deprived due to poor financial condition of the family. Such condition prompts parents to send their children to work in different hazardous places instead of sending them to school. With a view to keeping children away from this problem YCDA’s provides the Income Generation Programme Support & Linkages family with various govt. schemes which is praiseworthy. Such support has helped children to continue their studies, improved families financial condition and their lifestyle. Linking families with various schemes of Government is the most effective way of bringing positive change in the family. People, due to their weak voice and ignorance of their rights, are leading a miserable life despite many populist measures initiated by the government. Hence, we have been trying our best to pave the way of accessing the services of the schemes. We are just facilitating the process, through legitimate lobby and advocacy with the administration, in getting their basic minimum needs to lead a minimum standard life in the society.
During the period 18 nos. of families have been linked in IAY, NFBS, Old age, Widow Pension, CWB schemes and availed it. For family strengthening programme YCDA provide 12 revolving fund supports to the families to run the income generation activities. Staffs visi
By Subhrata Jena | Project Contributor
By Subhrata Jena | Project Contributor
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