Child Reintegration and Deinstitutionalization Training Phase I

$1924.3 Raised of $1,924 Goal

Project Summary: 
In conjunction with the Kenyan Government Children’s office in Nakuru county, Kitechild is sponsoring an Exit Strategy Training for 27 partner orphanages and children's shelters. The training will be focused on each center implementing re-integration and exit strategy policies for eligible children in their centers. As much as Kitechild supports orphanages through sustainable projects, we strongly believe, after years of research in the field, that these orphanages should operate as temporary rescue centers for those children that are in dire need of shelter, care, and support, which is typically about 10 % of each center’s population. Per government policy, children should not reside in these centers more than 3 years, after which point they are reunited with their families, adopted, or placed in foster care. While this is not always possible, every effort must be made to keep children and families together, and provide better and more intensive care to those children who are in dire need.

Number of Children Impacted : 1,209 children total, with 27 Children's Centers and Orphanages participating.

Impact

Short term:

• The main objective of this training is to partner with the government of Kenya Children's Department in Nakuru County in helping caretakers and social workers in orphanages to understand and internalize why a child is best placed with their families and communities rather than in the institutions.
• The government of Kenya has standards and policies, drafted with the aid of UNICEF, for orphanages, of which re-integration is a key component in these policies. Hence as much as we support provision of quality care for high risk children in orphanages through sustainable projects, we also want to be at the forefront in advocating for children to be de-institutionalized and be placed back in a  family setup  when possible, for the best interest of the child.

Long term:

• The major goal is for children to be re-integrated back to their community through a well developed exit strategy.  This is usually a slow process, so we hope by 2018 we will start to see a handful of successful cases of re-integration. In addition, this training and subsequent follow ups will develop outreach programs to support children who are back home, i.e. providing for their educational costs while at home, providing nutrition, etc. In the end, only those children who are truly in need of shelter and care will reside in these children's centers, while 'social' orphans, or those bred out of poverty, will be able to live with their families.

Partner Background: 

27 Orphanages, Children's Center's, and rescue centers have signed up to participate in the training. The training will be co-hosted by Kitechild employee Martha Maina, who has over 20 years of experience in the field working with at-risk children, as well as the government children's district officer for Nakuru, Eunice Njerinjugg. All polices and strategies are pulled from research by UNICEF and Save the Children, in conjunction with successful training strategies already in place in other centers.