Reports on Provide Education for Talented Roma Children

Project Report | Nov 14, 2017
Young Roma leaders in Strasbourg

By Mgr. Zuzana Rodakova | junior manager

At the end of October a group of young Roma leaders came to European political central city – Strasbourg. The aim of their short visit was to establish the international cooperation and relations, necessary for advocacy of the Young Roma needs from all the European Union. The intention was to present work of our group of Young Roma leaders and find out more about the other young leaders in Europe, become more familiar with activities of Council of Europe, European Parliament, Youth Centre of Council of Europe and the representatives of youth politics on European level.

First meeting we had, was with Julien Muriel – representative of European Youth Centre.She brought us closer the argument of youth work, active participation of Youth to creation of politics, that concerns them. And our Young Roma leaders represented their activities and advocacy on elementary schools in Slovakia.

Then we visited Council of Europe, where we met with Marcela Hanusová- Slovak representative , who introduced us the main role and structure of Council of Europe, focusing on Roma minority.

We were looking forward a meeting in modern building European Parliament, where we had an appointment with Slovak member of EU parlament –Ivan Štefanec. He presented his work and tried to motivate Young Roma leaders to work hard on their education. The best experience of this visit was to be a part of political debate right in the plenum of EU Parliament.

Very challenging was a meeting with Margarita Bogatziev – young representative of Model European Parliament, who informed Young Roma leaders about a possibility to experience an internship in EU. After this interesting discussion, we had an unexpected meeting with Ján Hero- Slovak representative of expert commission of Council of Europe for Roma people, who inspired us by his touching life story, that can be an example of all Young people from disadvantaged areas, that everybody can reach his very best, if he works hard on it.

Beside these challenging meetings and discussions, we did not miss neither the nice wolks in the historic center of Strasbourg. For most of our Young leaders this was a first experience to travel abroad and to contact with European political authorities.

Thanks to you, our great sponsors and supporters we can organise a lot of events for these children and youth every year. There they can work on improving their talents, skills and personalities. We can also organise small trips, train our mentors (who are the second parents of our children) and also deal with unexpected expenses and hard life situations of our children, that unfortunately sometimes occurs.

Thanks to your support and your donations via GlobalGiving we change lives of talented Roma children who need it the most. We would be very pleased if you became our donor and support our activities. With your help we can create new generation of Roma- educated, hardworking, confident and proud.

We thank you very much from the bottom of our hearts for your support :-)

Yours Divé maky

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Oct 10, 2017
Dive maky crossed own borders

By Michaela Gogova | Mgr.

Children of our programme grow and they come with the need to give something to their community. This initiative has created project „Young Roma Leaders“, within they run workshops at schools and learn to advocate the interests of Roma children. We wanted to create space for young leaders to develop and motivate them, so we have created the project of youth foreign exchange „Crossing Own Borders". The educational mobility environment aims to promote their participation in democratic life in Europe and in the labor market, foster their language skills, active citizenship, intercultural dialogue, social inclusion and solidarity. An important part of youth exchange is mutual intercultural learning.

We organized youth exchange for the first time in our history. The young people from Bulgaria, Lithuania, Hungary, Norwayand Slovakia met in Slovak capital city, Bratislava. They spent 6 days (25.8.-31.8.2017) full of learning, acquaintance and unforgettable experiences. The Project Crossing Own Borders was conducted through the program Erasmus+and the patronage of this successful event was taken over by Andrej Kiska, the President of the Slovak Republic.

It was the leaders, who planned the program on days. Already in this first phase, they communicated in English. They were introduced through videos and photos on social networks. To get the most out of our cultures, the program has been set up by other countries every day. The program was designed according to the set thematic areas.

The first was the host country, Slovakia, with the topic Roma people. Young Roma leaders prepared a presentation about Slovakia connected with the tasting of traditional Slovak dishes and snacks. „Bryndzové halušky“, Slovak cheeses, but also „horalky“ and especially „kofola“ have been successful! J They created City Game Bratislava tailor made. From the Bratislava castle they headed to Eurovea Square, where our guests had a surprise in the form of the festival „Cigánsky bašavel“ (Gypsy Bashavel - festival of our organisation Divé maky, o.z.).

The other days were designed by foreign countries. The Norwegians have prepared a variety of competitions, games, a quiz, and also practicing of dance choreography. The topic of the day was Creativity and Culture. Within the same thematic area, a group of young people from Lithuania has touched us by musical performance and workshops. Bulgarians surprised us with beautiful traditional costumes, which they brought us straight from Bulgaria. They played a theatre, danced folk dances and even borrowed costumes to the others. The topic of their presentation was Inclusion and equity. The topic of Hungarian group was Roma people and others minorities. They have revealed the ingredients of food and their national culture.

All the groups were very responsible for creation of the program. Participants spent days full of lectures, experiential learning, tasting national specialties, music or dancing. They have expanded their English vocabulary, made a new friendships. In addition to these great experiences, participants of youth exchange have been awarded the Youthpass - certificate, which can help them to further plans.

At the beginning, there was the fear of the communication, but this language barrier broke very quickly. Even those who controlled English at a lower level tried to actively engage in conversation around each other and understand others as much as possible. Despite cultural differences, they found their way and created a friendly atmosphere. The fact that they really had a strong relationship with each other has also confirmed their emotional departure. We believe that we will see our new foreign friends in the future and that this pilot project will be continue.

Thanks to you, our great sponsors and supporters we can organise a lot of events for these children and youth every year. There they can work on improving their talents, skills and personalities. We can also organise small trips, train our mentors (who are the second parents of our children) and also deal with unexpected expenses and hard life situations of our children, that unfortunately sometimes occurs.

Thanks to your support and your donations via GlobalGiving we change lives of talented Roma children who need it the most. We would be very pleased if you became our donor and support our activities. With your help we can create new generation of Roma- educated, hardworking, confident and proud.

We thank you very much from the bottom of our hearts for your support :-)

Yours

Divé maky, o.z.

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Jul 7, 2017
"Crossing own borders"

By Zuzana Rodakova | junior manager

This year we decided to organise Youth exchange for the very first time. The members of the exchange group will be young people from social disadvanteged areas from Slovakia and 4 other countries, which are Hungary, Lithuania, Bulgaria and Norway.

The biggest challange of this project is the fact, that it is whole organised by youngsters coordinated by their support team from each country. It is a great experience for them, where they can learn how to work in teams and how to be a part of a coordinating group, that creates independently bases for each exchange activity.

Through learning mobility we want to encourage their participation in democratic life in Europe and the labor market, promote their language skills, active citizenship, intercultural dialogue, social inclusion and solidarity. The common element that unites all young people in this project is that everyone is involved in advocacy, activation or volunteer activities in their communities, and as the main working and communication tool is used their talent and art. Several participants of the project are Roma and youth from socially disadvantaged environment or people with fewer opportunities who have never had the opportunity to travel outside the borders of their state.

The Slovak group is attended by 10 youth from the Roma communities who have never been abroad and have no contact with youth from abroad or information about other European cultures. This group is mandated to coordinate and plan the whole international youth exchange. Since they have no experience with such activity with support and help of project team will they learn how to organize such activity and they will also learn to communicate with foreign partners in English. In total from 41 youth participants are 29 of all youth with fewer opportunities. Most of them come from Roma communities or other socially disadvantaged backgrounds.

Now our Slovakian group of youngsters had a skype call with the other members of youth exchange, where they settled a several details and created a base for further cooperation. They have also created a facebook group, that all the participants are members and they post every time in a while status or a video about what they have achieved or what is the next step to do.

Thanks to you, our great sponsors and supporters we can organise a lot of events for these children and youth every year. There they can work on improving their talents, skills and personalities. We can also organise small trips, train our mentors (who are the second parents of our children) and also deal with unexpected expenses and hard life situations of our children, that unfortunately sometimes occurs.

Thanks to your support and your donations via GlobalGiving we change lives of talented Roma children who need it the most. We would be very pleased if you became our donor and support our activities. With your help we can create new generation of Roma- educated, hardworking, confident and proud.

We thank you very much from the bottom of our hearts for your support :-)

Yours

Divé maky, o.z.