Ongoing activites, recent projects
Since 1995, STREP has been continually providing social activation services for families with children, delivering/running programs focused on social-legal protection of vulnerable children and on support for their families. Furthermore STREP runs innovative methodological-development projects as a response to the changing needs of vulnerable children and families in the context of the development/changes of society, legislation and of the Child Care System. In general, these projects strive to develop tools of case managements/case conferences, innovative field activities of social-legal protection of children and tools interconnecting social work and pedagogical approach to enhance competencies of parents as the first educators of their children and to promote inclusion in education (piloting the tools while working with children and families in the field, support of content/processes in multidisciplinary approach/cooperation, assessment/monitoring, methodological recommendations, professional publications).
Some examples of the most recent projects, app. since 2013:
- Innovation in SLPC (social-legal protection of children) for Children at Risk: Measurement of the Impact, Journey of Change and Mobile Teams – the project brings the in the UK licenced tool Outcomes Star into the SLPC agenda (in a pilot way in the Prague district 8) that assesses/measures the impact of social work and supports the change in children at risk of CAN and their parents. It is about increasing skills of the target group towards the social integration and about the prevention of social-pathological phenomena.
- Prevention of the Impacts of Traumatic Situations on Vulnerable Children – see in the project section. Supported by Sirius Foundation, see more in the section of this project.
- Family Strengthening Is Cooperation – focused on promoting multidisciplinary help for socially vulnerable families with children, STREP and other members of multidisciplinary teams were delivering help to 109 vulnerable families with 188 children (at 70-80% cases success achieved). Other outcomes of the project: three seminars, one national conference, 4 round tables, 10 multidisciplinary supervision meetings, 1 educational program for hundreds of professionals organized and run, methodological recommendations for promoting multidisciplinary cooperation created and distributed. A part of the book Case conferences (V. Bechynova, Praha, Portál, 2012) written by the STREP's director was based on the experiences from the project. The project was run in close cooperation with the PragueCity Hall and some Prague districts. Based on the feedbacks received, STREP has contributed to the development and implementation of case conferences (a significant tool of multidisciplinary cooperation and case management) in the Capital of Prague and in some other regions/Municipalities across the Czech Republic. Supported by Sirius Foundation.
- Home – Visiting in Endangered Roma Families – intended for socially vulnerable Roma parents with children aged 0-6 (including pre-natal period) in the context of early care/learning and intercultural environments, focused on parenting skills training/strengthening and promotion of inclusion in education. The following activities run: active screening, home-visiting, creation of methodological recommendations and educational training programs for the professional public. The aims of the project:
- To strengthen and empower vulnerable Roma parents so that they are able to understand/identify needs of their children and to ensure conditions for their healthy development in all areas.
- To promote inclusion of vulnerable Roma children to “mainstream” pre-school and school educational system.
- To influence practice through creating and disseminating methodological recommendations and educational training programs for professionals.
The capacity of home visiting is 25 families per year. The project was planned for three year, the first two years were assessed/evaluated as successful and STREP was awarded a grant for the following year. The project is due to be completed during the year 2015. Supported by Open Society Fund Prague and Open Society Foundations.
STREP organizes and runs seminars, workshops, round tables and conferences for professionals, provides methodological consultations/counselling to the professionals/workers in the field of family strengthening (for example Salinger Hradec Králové, Domus Plzeň), moderates case conferences for social workers of Social and Legal Protection of Children Office.
Last but not least, STREP organizes and runs accredited educational programmes for social workers and other professionals and educational programs “made to order” for professional institutions/organizations (for example “Municipality Office” of Karlovarsky region, Ombudsman Office, Central Office of Labour, Social Affairs and Family Bratislava - Slovakia, Polička Charity).
In November 2014, STREP successfully went through a pilot volunteer audit within the project “ The Support of Quality in Lifelong and Qualification Education of Employees in Social Services”. In the audit, the two accredited educational programs focused on case conferences were included. The certificate was issued by the Ministry of Labour and Social Affairs and the Lifelong Education Fund.
International cooperation
- Organizing study visits (for example to Sweden, France)
- Lecturing within accredited educational programs (for example Slovakia)
- Attending workshops conferences (for example Bulgaria, Slovakia, Norway)
- Using professional resources