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A Generous Gift from the Rotary Club of Coventry

On the 23rd of September the CEO of the International Children’s Trust, Wahiba Kiared, received a generous contribution of £2000 from Rotarian Kenneth Holmes of the Rotary Club of Coventry. This gift will be used by the Chiedza Charity in Harare, Zimbabwe, to give educational opportunities to children aged between nine and fifteen years of age, who are not in education. 

We are very grateful to members of the club for their long-term support of ICT and for nominating this partner as their chosen charity of the year. Chiedza is also our ‘champion’ charity of this year, as it has made a significant impact on the community of 1,800 households in Harare, through a joint ‘Saving and Lending’ programme.

Link to the Rotary Club of Coventry:  www.coventryrotary.org

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Speaker Nights

In September the Rotary Club of Hull Kingston accepted the invitation from our CEO, Wahiba Kiared, to present the work of ICT at one of their ‘Speaker Nights’. We had a very enjoyable evening and members were very responsive and interested to hear about our work. The sponsorship of this Rotary Club continues to make a great contribution to the lives of three children in Ecuador and in the very near future the club is also hosting a wine tasting evening in order to raise more funds for these children. We are extremely grateful to all the members for their support and enthusiasm.

The JUCONI Ecuador sponsorship programme in Guayaquil gives children a chance to go to school and equips them with the necessary tools to shape their own future. 

By becoming a sponsor today, you will see how your contribution could go a long way to help unlock opportunities for the most educationally disadvantaged children. Get in contact with us to get more information about child sponsorship.

Rotary Club of Hull Kingston on Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/Rotary-Club-of-Hull-Kingston-102201997811738/

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JUCONI Mexico Early Childhood Development and Parent Attunement Programme.

JUCONI Mexico is located in the state of Puebla, two hours away from Mexico City. For more than 30 years, JUCONI Mexico has been working with children who drop out of, or who are not spotted by, existing government and NGO service provision. Our experience shows that a violent family environment contributes to children being on the streets and if it continues, is transferred from one generation to another.

In order to address this situation, JUCONI Mexico delivers a 12 month ‘Early Childhood Development and Parent Attunement Programme’, for 170 street market children aged between 0 to 5 years old. These children spend a lot of time alone, with no supervision, in the markets where their parents work, and this also puts them at risk of abuse and exploitation. The programme uses innovative therapeutic techniques to strengthen parents and care-givers skills by getting them to observe and reflect on their child’s early stage of development through the use of free play and video sessions. 

ICT started to give additional support to this programme in April 2019 and it now involves older siblings, family visits to museums and the use of  a ‘HOME’ inventory by JUCONI family educators to help them to assess the family life of the children and parenting. This is done through a series of interviews with the families in their homes. 

Ana and her daughter María have benefitted from the free play and video sessions and Ana says, “Video changed my life (…) I saw how María looked at me and how important I was to her and that she wanted to be with me. I saw that I can be a good mum.” Ana is now part of a mother’s group and María attends a day centre on a regular basis.

Ana’s husband Luis was also encouraged to participate in some of  the sessions, in order to address and prevent the use of violence within the home. Recently Ana told us that when her in-laws disapprove of the way in which she is bringing up María, Luis now supports her. This is the first time that Ana has had the courage to stand up for what she thinks is right. “I used to think that it was all down to JUCONI, but now I know that it is me. I have changed.”

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Keoogo Village for Street Girls and their Children in Burkina Faso.

In Burkina Faso we partner with a local organisation called Keoogo, which offers protection and rehabilitation services to children living on the streets. In Burkina Faso, poverty, intrafamily violence and early pregnancy can force girls aged between 12 to 18 years old to run away from home and end up living on the streets, where they can be exposed to further exploitation and violence.

Keoogo has recently built a community-led, walled village 17 km north of the capital Ouagadougou, to provide food, protection, health care, education and vocational training for girls living on the streets with their children. The village’s name is ‘Beoogo Tienbo’, which means ‘Hope for the Future’ in Moore, the main spoken language of Burkina Faso. 

The main objectives of the project are as follows: to improve the well-being and life-prospects of these girls and their children; to provide a 12 month programme of vocational training and skills development to increase the girls’ chances of integration into the local labour market; to introduce income-generating ‘micro-activities’ to ensure a reliable source of income for the girls and their children in the long-term. 

The village will also offer access to a nursery school, a playground, a food bank and other facilities to 6000 members of the surrounding community. To ensure post-funding sustainability and viability of the village, the project aims to develop agro-ecological activities through vocational training such as market gardening, bee-keeping and small-sized breeding as well as food service activities such as a bakery and a restaurant.

Providing an opportunity for these girls has already had an impact.

Quote from an 18 year old girl living in the village: “The Keoogo village allows me to live a family life. It gives meaning to my life.”

Quote from the mother of a 5 year old boy “Since we came to the village, my son has become more and more fulfilled. He has fun with others, eats well and has toys at his disposal. I am looking forward to seeing him go to the village nursery school in September.”

Due to the urgent need to provide these girls with the means to provide for themselves, the village has been open for a few months providing psychosocial counselling to the young mothers. However there is still a need for additional staff and more equipment to deliver the training component, as the current challenges for the project are in acquiring the equipment for the bakery, catering, weaving and sewing workshops. Increasing the food budget for the girls and their children is also another priority.

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SERVE Safeguarding and Eye-care Programmes.

SERVE is a Sri Lankan non-profit organisation working for the empowerment of the disadvantaged, especially children. SERVE has been in partnership with ICT for more than ten years. The project continues to support and empower children from poor, marginalised communities living in shanty towns and low-income housing schemes. 

At our children’s community centres we help children to complete their education successfully through bursarial support. In addition, our social workers also provide these children with guidance and counselling for the day to day psychosocial problems/abuse they may face at home, in the community and at school. We have also educated our community facilitators to create awareness among mothers about safeguarding their children from all forms of abuse, including sexual abuse. Two hundred families have taken part in this project so far.

In May 2019 our community eye care centre was opened in Moratuwa and can be accessed on Tuesdays and Saturdays from 9am – 4pm by the public. The project aims to help 500 children to receive free eye tests and spectacles in the coming year.

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A Success Story from Youth Alive in Ghana.

Milli is fourteen years old and a third year student at junior high school in the rural Upper East Region of Northern Ghana. She is the fifth of six siblings and the only girl in the family. Milli is a bright girl who started school at the age of three. The fact that her older brothers did not perform well at school and dropped out before completing their studies did not motivate Milli’s father to invest time and resources in her education. As he explained, “her older siblings were sent to school and did not prove that formal education was the best way to go” and so he was going to take her out of the education system once she finished primary school. He was also considering arranging an early marriage for her.

While she was at primary school, Milli’s family became reluctant to pay for school books and supplies and this started to have an impact on her performance. However, when she was nine years old, Youth Alive initiated a programme to improve enrolment, retention and performance in local schools and Milli’s community and school both benefitted from this project. The project also provided books and other learning materials to participating schools and to under-resourced children like Milli. Through this project, she was encouraged to join her school club and was selected to become a peer educator benefitting from attending a series of workshops which included ‘Assertiveness Training’, ‘Persuasive Communication Skills’, ‘Rights and Responsibilities of the Child’, ‘Responsibilities of Parents’ and ‘Child Protection and Safeguarding Procedures’. 

This period marked a turning point in Milli’s life. She started to feel more confident, increased her participation in class and her academic performance began to improve. Milli was made the leader of her school club; sharing her learning with her peers during school assemblies. She was also made head girl of her school. During this time her academic performance improved remarkably and she became one of the five best students in her class.

Milli continued to perform well and progress with the same level of confidence during her years at junior high school and represented the school during inter-school debates and quiz competitions. She is currently considered a model student in her school and is studying hard to sit for her Basic Education Certificate exams (BECE) so that she can progress to secondary school.                      

Milli says: “I underrated myself but the training workshops built up my confidence and helped me to realise that I can excel. I want to prove my parents wrong. I am determined to demonstrate to them that I am different from my older brothers and that one day I will change the status of my family. I want to be a nurse in the future so that I can take care of my family’s health needs and also help my community.”

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JUCONI Ecuador Safe Play Spaces Project.

The aim of this programme is to help 120 children – 70 boys and 50 girls – from under-resourced communities in Guayaquil to live happier, healthier and safer lives.

The level of violence within these communities continues to be a challenge as well as the use of psychoactive drugs by children as young as 6, 7 and 8 years of age. In these neighbourhoods, children are used to wandering the streets at different times of the day and night and can also be tempted into micro-trafficking as a way to earn “easy” money. These issues often lead to more crime, robberies, gang activity etc. and children, families and communities live in constant fear for their safety. 

There is a lack of sheltered playgrounds within these communities and the JUCONI Ecuador programme has developed child-friendly safe areas where children are able to take part in sport, games, have fun and develop healthy relationships with their peers. Trained JUCONI youth workers promote the practice of sport at it is seen as contributing to improving self-control and strengthening positive values such as solidarity, tolerance, discipline, teamwork, self-confidence and personal development.

At the same time, supporting parents is also seen as essential in preventing children from being at risk, so trained JUCONI counsellors offer guidance and support to a total of 104 parents and guardians. Weekly meetings are held to build on their knowledge about individual health and well-being, parenting and to help strengthen their social skills.

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SARTHI Health and Menstruation Programme for Adolescent Girls in Schools in Patna, India.

The aim of this project is to provide education and support for adolescent girls as many are missing school every month or dropping out, due to menstruation and associated health problems. These topics are often seen as a social taboo in communities and there is a lack of information and little access to sanitary products.

Middle School Maner Block, Patna District of Bihar State, India.

A young peer mentor and college student facilitated the first SARTHI pilot programme and the session provided a safe, friendly space for 28 adolescent girls to discuss the topic and related challenges. Based on the success of this first session and the positive feedback, the SARTHI programme has been replicated in four schools, benefitting 144 girls.

The girls reported that their main challenges were inadequate toilet and washing facilities so that they either stayed at home or went home early from school; the cost of sanitary pads; the problem of not having a healthy diet. Other subjects discussed included sex and gender discrimination and child marriage.

In the four schools, girls’ consortiums are now running composed of eighteen girls between the ages of 12 and 15 years of age, who act as peer mentors and receive training to become school health advisors. These girls talk not only to other girls in the same school, but also to their teachers, about the importance of maintaining good personal hygiene habits and eating healthier, affordable food by including seasonal fruit and vegetables in their diets.

At policy level, the SARTHI project is working with head teachers and school representatives in local Panchayat to advocate for comprehensive programmes on ‘Health and Hygiene’ for girls and also improving toilet and washing facilities and providing free sanitary pads with corresponding budgetary allocations.


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A Success Story from JUCONI Ecuador.

At the age of eight, Carolina started begging on the streets of her neighbourhood in order to escape a hostile family environment. After a while, she was spending so much time on the streets that she almost ended up living there.

Workers from JUCONI Ecuador established their first contact with Carolina when she was ten years old. They rescued her from a group of child traffickers by getting her a place in a children’s home where she had regular sessions with a children’s counsellor employed by JUCONI. At the same time the team also worked towards putting Carolina in touch with her family again, in an attempt to restore the bond between them. After two years of intervention and support through JUCONI, Carolina finally returned to live with her family.

Carolina is currently attending a high school for children with special educational needs. She is a friendly, sociable girl who enjoys studying and is positive about what she has achieved, despite everything that has occurred in the  past – “I am proud of myself as I am not the street child that I was before. I like the fact that I am studying.”

Carolina is also now part of a group of youth leaders within her community and loves to participate in events which focus on helping other children to overcome traumatic situations such as child labour, substance abuse and violence.

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Home and Education for Underprivileged Children Living in Rural Areas in India.

The Rotary Club of Madras Boys Town Project in Gummidipoondi.

The aim of this project is to provide a home, food, education and health care to 100 boys from low income rural households. This involves secondary education from 6th to 12th Grade (12 – 18 years of age) and includes boarding during term time, eating nutritious food, receiving regular tuition from qualified teachers in general subjects, plus access to music classes, yoga and physical education.

The boys also receive careers guidance to help them to make choices about academic, technical and vocational courses as they progress through the school. The success rate of the children for the academic year 2017-2018 was a remarkable 97%.

In order to ensure the long term sustainability of the home and to ensure that healthy food is provided for the children, the home works with local providers and receives wheat flour, rice and soap on a monthly basis.

In 2018, the home was satisfactorily audited by the National Commission of Child Rights and District Child Protection Team.

A Success Story from Boys Town.

A former pupil at Boys Town now works in a private software company in Chennai and earns a good salary. In between his work schedule, he finds time to return to Boys Town and give tuition classes to some of the students.

The Rotary Club of Madras. New Initiative.

In 2018 we adopted three villages, namely  Amarambedu, Panjalai and Kannankottai, and offer space for education in each village. Currently we provide classes to 28 out of 32 children – boys and girls – living in these villages.  Classes take place in centres situated in teachers’ homes and these centres are visited twice a month to collect feedback from the children and then adjust the content of the programme as necessary. The visits are also useful to address any issues and to ensure the compliance by teachers to the safeguarding and operational policies of the Rotary Club of Madras.

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Last year the Rotary Club of Madras Boys Town Project invited children from the three villages to join them in celebrating the 72nd ‘Independence Day of India’ and this was accepted with great enthusiasm. A group of girls performed a traditional dance and gave a speech in English about the meaning of the celebration and a group of boys did a yoga demonstration. All those participating received a certificate of appreciation as a reward for their performances.