Summer School for Children without Parents

Dear All,

Over the past few months we have been working hard with ~50 children living without parental care in four Bulgarian cities (Sofia, Plovdiv, Berkovitsa and Varna) to make sure they complete successfully our yearlong life-skills education program. In the meantime, we have also been thinking of the best way to re-format our Summer Academy program in order to maximize the impact on the participating youths’ preparation for independent life given the limited resources we have. After much consideration of various options, the Step for Bulgaria management team decided to pilot this summer a new format of our Summer Academy that would provide our target group of teenagers with hands-on professional experience. The new format will consist of:

1.       Two three-day long motivational sessions to help the youth develop professional attitudes and understanding of employers’ essential expectations: responsibility, ownership, honesty and reliability. In addition, we’ll be fostering a sense of community among the group.

2.       A 2-3 week internship for each student at one employer, which will require of them to go to work every day, complete tasks at different functions of the organization, and meet their employer’s expectations. Each teenager will be paired with a volunteer mentor, who would check on the intern at the end of each work-day to make sure the kid is learning what it takes to be a good employee and a respected colleague. Mentors will be there to support both the intern and their employer in setting and living up to their mutual expectations.

3.       If needed, several weeks of additional vocational training depending on the needs of each student.

4.       We would also like to provide the participating youth with English lessons, as they all recognize the importance of speaking fluently this international language. We’ll do our best to provide a volunteer teacher who could teach them every day after work.

We’ve so far selected 10 teenagers of age 16 and above (from Sofia, Plovdiv and Berkovitsa) who we believe will be able to match employer expectations and take seriously their internship this summer. Their professional interests vary from cooking and bar tending to theater acting and sports. We’ll do our best to identify appropriate internships and vocational trainings for each. Based on the results and impact we see on their development this summer, we intend to expand the re-formatted Summer Academy to more children next year.  

Thanks to the hard work of our volunteers and board members, we have applied for and won a grant from the Bulgarian Foundation: Workshop for Civil Initiatives which will cover 80% of our program costs, including the Summer Academy, for next year (~15,000 EUR). We hope we can raise the other 20% with your great help and continuous support.

Thank you all for maintaining your contributions and providing spiritual support when we need them the most! Without you, our work and our students’ personal growth and development as responsible and successful adults would be impossible! Thank you!

Best,

Step for Bulgaria management team