Description
The project consists of supporting educational achievement of socially disadvantaged children in Plzeň, particularly those from poor Roma families, through management of volunteer based tutoring (after school lessons), cooperation with teachers and school personnel, working on children's motivation to continue their education carriers and counseling provided to parents in educational matters. The project deals with multiple disadvantages and challenges that Roma children face vis a vis the highly selective system od primary education in the Czech republic on one hand, and low expectations and aspirations in educational matters within their families and communities on the other hand. The project will help the children accomplish more in their education, navigate through the mostly majority tailored primary and secondary school system and also expect more from their own education. It will also help the poor Roma parents support their children's educational achievements.
Summary of project results
Socially excluded families with children living in Pilsen are the target group of this project. This population can be characterized as struggling with long-term unemployment, social security benefits dependence, extensive idebtedness and low levels of education. The basic rationale we worked with in this project is that the more education the higher the chances of a change in the behavioral patterns and aspirations of the target group. SPOLEČNOST TADY A TEĎ, o.p.s. has been offering Education support in Pilsen since 2004 (for the same target group). The project thus enabled much-needed continuity of this kind of social service. The secondary goal of the project was to strengthen the capacity and sustainability of the organization through the inception of coordinated fundraising activities. Three strategic documents were created to start an organization-professionalization process and systematic fundraising. Thanks to the project, organization could start to cooperate with new clients who would otherwise be rejected because of the low capacities. Together, social workers, volunteers, children and their parents worked together and tried to react on the everyday struggles at school. It means that social workers and volunteers communicated also with various other institutional actors in the educational ecology – be it teachers, special pedagogues, psychologists or logopedists. Moreover, the organization is constantly aiming to tune-up the Education support service. That is why the project also helped to design a completely new outcome – a questionaire for teachers was prepared and filled in with teachers from 10 different schools. It enabled to create a new data based upon a comparison of teachers evaluation of the child-client’s performance at the beginning and at the end of the contract.
Summary of bilateral results