11/06/2008 - In 2004 the UN Committee on the Rights of the Child gave the impulse for the development of guidelines on the protection of children without parental care. A group of NGOs, including SOS Children's Villages, prepared the first draft guidelines and since August 2006 the guidelines are being discussed by government experts under the leadership of the Brazilian government. More...03/04/2008 - From April 8-10, three years of planning and conceptualisation will be drawn together at a workshop in Cairo intended to launch a regional process to formulate Arab Guidelines for Children without Parental Care. More...31/03/2008 - Another success for the Quality4Children Standards: The Maltese Ministry for the Family and Social Solidarity has used the Q4C Standards as a basis for their "National Standards for Residential Child Care" which were launched for consultation in February. More... "De-institutionalisation" is a rather unwieldy term. It is the opposite of administration and refers to one of the most important processes in out-of-family childcare in Central and Eastern Europe and the Former Soviet Union. SOS Children's Villages is involved in this reform process, in one form or another, in 19 countries. The objective is to either fundamentally change the institutional system or replace the old system with alternative forms of care and establish social support for families. More... "I can't remember exactly when I started to feel comfortable with my foster family. Maybe when I was getting washed. Cleanliness is very important to me. You know¿ being put to bed at 7.30 p.m., maybe being carried all wrapped up in a towel, getting a bowl of fruit, always eating meals at the same time... everything is structured. Small things such as these are so important."
More... "Everybody from the village came to our house to see me and my children. There I'd been for seventeen years with no children and all of a sudden I had eleven children, including a baby. They were all happy and smiled at me."
More... As part of the process of developing new strategic initiatives for the work of SOS Children's Villages, a study was carried out on the work, concerns and wishes of 300 SOS mothers from 27 different countries. What are their greatest concerns? What do they need to enable them to form a new family for children and, in doing so, a community?
More... Being an SOS mother is a special profession with special duties, which presents particular challenges. It is also a profession which, just like all others, requires a clear definition of what the job entails and what skills are needed for it. Women need to do vocational training in order to become SOS mothers.
More... Sandra Bürger, 20, is one of the young people on Quality4Children's (Q4C) steering team which represents the voice of the youth. She moved into an SOS Youth Facility in Austria when she was 15. She looks at the topic of "Quality Standards in Out-of-Home Care" from the point of view of those concerned, from the "inside".
More...Quality4Children is integrally based on the experiences, narrations and personal contributions of those involved: from children and youths who live or have lived in out-of-home care, biological families and foster families, social workers, facility co-workers (SOS Children's Villages, FICE, IFCO) and government offices (social ministry, youth welfare, among others).
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