Introduction kids to life
Senegal 2023/2024 – Residential and training center for street children
In Senegal, many children are handed over to marabouts as pupils (talibé). They often end up with an exploitative marabout and are forced to beg by force, or they flee to the streets.
Perspective Senegal offers escaped and abused Talibés a safe haven and a chance of a normal life. In the training and residential center in Deni Biram, the children learn to process their trauma and develop trust again. They grow up in a family-like community and can train as shoemakers, carpenters or metalworkers in the workshops, opening up new prospects for their future.
The housing and training center in Deni Biram
The area from above
In addition to the craft apprenticeships, the children also receive adapted schooling. Some of them make the transition to the local school and concentrate entirely on their schooling with the aim of studying afterwards. The children are all supported until they have completed their training. This gives them the courage to have new dreams and goals for life and the confidence to pursue them. They are also encouraged by the success stories of the young adults who have already completed their training. The majority of the trainers at the center are former street boys who grew up at the Perspektive Senegal Center. They serve as role models for the children and are able to deal well with their apprentices thanks to their own experience.
Thanks to ongoing support from the Help Children Foundation for the costs of running and renovation work, the project has a foundation on which it can build. However, we also ask for further donations so that the project can continue to develop and we can give many children a better future.
More than 110 children have been admitted to the center since 2009. Most of them have already left the center and are standing on their own two feet. Some of the older boys will soon move out again and start their own business with the trade they have learned or begin studying in the city. This will create space to take in more children. The aim is to reopen a day care center where contact with the street children can be established. Help us to make this possible and offer more street children a safe home and prospects for the future.
Appeal for donations – Benefit event for Back to School – The rolling classroom
Report in the Landsberger Tagblatt: Claus-Peter Reisch – Hilfe für Menschen in Not gGmbH is organizing a charity event with Günter Grünwald on 21 March 2024 at 19:00 in the Schlossberghalle in Starnberg.
The donations will all go to the Back to School project – The rolling classroom – buses that are converted for teaching purposes for refugee and camp children who would otherwise have no opportunity to integrate into the Turkish school system.
Donations can also be made to the Help Children Foundation, which fully supports the project. On the one hand, new buses need to be equipped to reach more children, and on the other, running costs need to be covered, such as fuel costs and salaries for Turkish-Syrian teachers who can introduce the children to the Turkish school. The project looks small at first, but it can have a huge impact if the children who already attend a Turkish school then teach their families and friends, so that more and more children from camps can become ready for school. As a wise man once said: a great journey begins with one step.
And here they are: The First Steps: Donate and be part of it! Thank you!
Homepage of Claus-Peter Reisch
https://claus-peter-reisch.com
The article in Landsberger Tagblatt Online:
Back to school – A second mobile classroom is coming!
The second rolling classroom was put into operation on December 18, 2023. Around 90 children in six classes are now attending preparatory lessons and around 150 children are attending kindergarten. The project was launched by the organization Claus-Peter Reisch – Hilfe für Menschen in Not gGmbH in partnership with IMECE with the aim of enabling as many of these forgotten Syrian children as possible to attend school and thus open up new prospects for the future. In this project, the Help Children Foundation is supporting the purchase and conversion of the buses as well as the ongoing operation of the school and kindergarten.
The 2nd rolling classroom from the inside:
The children are concentrated and enthusiastic during the lessons. The children love to learn! Any child who is not encouraged cannot develop their full potential as an adult. That’s why it’s so important to do everything we can to ensure that children can learn! And that is what Help Children Foundation stands for – so that children can learn and develop!
Lale – Tulip – Maybe the first word you learned in Turkish language 🙂
Full House in the bus!
Senegal Nov. 2023: Visit to the center of Perspektive Senegal
In November 2023, Lea Fall once again visited the Perspektive Senegal residential and training center. The center is located in Deni Biram, a small village near the capital Dakar. The former street children grow up here in a family community and can train as shoemakers, carpenters or metalworkers in the workshops.
Heinz Ulrich, the new managing director of Perspektive Senegal, was also on site and was able to give a good insight into the current situation.
Lea Fall and Heinz Ulrich
A visit to the carpentry workshop
New equipment in the metal workshop
In the cobbler’s workshop
The vegetable garden
Due to the sharp rise in prices for food and salaries, the financial requirements in 2023 were particularly high. Thanks to the financial support of the Help Children Foundation, together with other partners and donors, the increased financial requirements for food and salaries in 2023 could be covered. This made it possible to provide ongoing care for the 26 former street children.
Last year, the focus was on maintaining and renovating the facilities. The boys’ home, built in 2009, was partly in a pitiful state as it had never been renovated. With the financial support of the Help Children Foundation, all rooms and corridors in the boys’ dormitory were renovated so that they now shine in vibrant colors. The boys were involved in the color selection process by being allowed to choose their preferred colors.
The rooms and corridors in the boys’ dormitory shine in new colors
Exterior façade of the boys’ home
Further donations will be used to renovate the entire exterior façade and replace the faulty electrics in the coming year. The restoration of the building also symbolizes the possible inner restoration of the mentally and physically injured former street children.