Republic of Mari El from 23 to 27 of December 2015 at the “Shap” recreation center within the project “Challenges of social change” hosted a seminar for volunteers working with orphans and children left without parental care.
The organizer of the project was Regional Youth Public Organization for Support of Civil Initiatives of the Republic of Mari El “OPORA” with the financial support of the European Youth Foundation. Partners of the project were: Ministry of Education and Science of the Republic of Mari El, “ProfProekt” Ltd, as well as representatives of some non-governmental youth NGOs.
The main topics for the seminar were: gender equality, social rights, social integration, discrimination, specifics of working with children in difficult life situation. The main idea of the seminar was to improve the professional competence of the volunteers, that will promote social integration of youth in difficult life situations who live in orphanages and boarding schools, through their involvement in active social life, and raising awareness about active citizenship, human rights and opportunities for volunteering.
Public organization “OPORA” was presented by coordinator of international projects Azat Fattakhov. He presented the objectives, methods and project activities, and also introduced the trainers in the field of non formal education and human rights, employees of the NGO “Youth for the Future” of the city of Grozny Gelgoev Bekhan and Zulikhan Aliyeva.
“The organization of such an initiative as a seminar-training for the active youth of Mari El Republic enabled youth to talk about their civic engagement, values, tools, and on the other hand to raise issues of work with children, social rights, social adaptation, gender equality, as well as to find ways and solutions together with the target group of the project “, – said Azat Fattakhov.
Over 20 young volunteers from different regions of the Republic of Mari El joined the project and became one big team which intends to bring up orphans opportunities for active citizenship, based on the values of human rights that are declared by the Council of Europe.
The culmination of the project will be the workshops of volunteers in social institutions with children on topics -sirot active citizenship and to volunteering, using the methods of non-formal education.
