Recent events
Equilibrium Christmas campaign, 2011
Irrespective of our religion or how we feel about the commercialization of Christmas, we must accept that the celebrations introduce wonder and magic to the lives of children meaning that it is a time at which the disadvantage suffered by many youngsters is poignantly felt.
For a second year, we did everything we could to provide some of this magic to the vulnerable children we work with helped by of all our friends, partners and the generosity of the people of Ruse. This year, children, employees, foster and adoptive parents, students and friends of our organisation worked hard for more than a month to provide a stock of over 600 unique objects in a tsunamai of creativity – cards, souvenirs, candlesticks and table decorations and knitwear. We would like to thank them for donating their labour and special thanks to those who also provided their own materials.
This year’s campaign raised over 1125 leva (577 Euro). We provided a Christmas party and gift bags at the complex for more than sixty children, a party and presents for the eight disabled residents of the Pink House and distributed thirty gift bags to socially disadvantaged children in the nearby village of Dryanovets during the Christmas village show. Selections of treats were bought with the fundraised money while books, magazines and felt tip pens had been donated by generous benefactors.
The money raised will help fund activities at the Complex and outings for over 70 children during 2012. We would like to say a big thank you to all those who made donations or bought our hand-made crafts sold at the Christmas village in the city square and Mall Rouse. We must thank Plamen Stoilov, the city mayor, for providing us with a free hut and for his kind words of support of the campaign. In addition, this is not the first time we have benefited from the cooperation and kindness of the management at Mall Rouse. Again, a very big Thank you.
We have already embarked on our next campaign but it stays a secret until later.
Thank you all for your wonderful generosity that brought to life the Christmas spirit of kindness and joy for over 100 children in need.
22nd November 2011 marked the start of the second phase of the project ‘Children meet their new friends - the horses’, run by Equilibrium, ‘Open Society’ Club and the Еquestrian Club ‘BTB’ - Ruse
The first stage of the project focused on hipotherapy – the therapeutic aspect of bringing disabled children in contact with horses that has implications in terms of both physical rehabilitation and socialization. The participants were children from the small group home – the Pink House and others accompanied by their parents.
The second stage of the project focuses on problematic behaviour and it involved 11 children from our centre for street children. On 22nd November, they met their new four-legged friends for the first time and were introduced to tack and gear and each had the chance to ride with an instructor. These children are improving their social skills by learning to ride and are shown how to guide and control a horse after mounting and how to negotiate jumps and obstacles. The horses are trained to recognize if the rider on their back is inexperienced, so they are perfect for children. With the introduction of horse riding and animal care, as an educational method, the children become active participants in a new social process while also developing practical skills and confidence.
Equilibrium took part in a studio debate helping the Flanders government tackle Child Poverty - 30 November-4 December 2011
Flanders DC is a government funded ‘creativity centre’ in the ancient city of Leuven, near the Belgian capital of Brussels. During a 5-day period starting on 30th November, 2011, the facility hosted a studio discussion based on a model developed in Helsinki that brought together eight experts from throughout the European Union to meet local stakeholders in the development of the country’s childcare policy, visit community-based services and design a 10-point strategy document to assist the development of the Flemish Child Poverty Action Programme.
In actual fact, the review extended beyond childcare to embrace social welfare, fiscal / tax policy, education, health, social integration of immigrant groups, housing policy and governance in the area of child poverty.
The creativity centre is a special facility that provides comfortable space for groups to come together for intensive discussion with high-tech communication support and all the comforts necessary to support the process of creative debate.
Equilibrium’s chairman, David Bisset, was among the team of experts that included senior advisors to the Flemish and British governments and childcare practitioners from as far afield as Scandinavia and Bulgaria with different professional backgrounds. They provided a variety of perspectives on the best way to meet the needs of very young children (aged 0-3) living in circumstances of poverty.
Over and above having brief but extensive conversations with a variety of service providers and studying government analysis and descriptions of the basic outline of the current plan, the experts were joined during the ‘brainstorming’ phase of their work together, by people from the worlds of art and cutting-edge scientific research who helped to provide innovative, radical and high-impact ideas in a very short period of time.
As far as anyone is aware, this is the first time that the intensive studio method has been used for the sake of policy development in social welfare provision. The initiative had the full support of the Minister for Poverty of Flanders and a government team was constantly available to provide detailed information and support the process.
The five days of intensive work culminated in a presentation given to a mixed audience of stakeholders that included Ingred Lieten, Flemish Minister for Innovation, Public Investment, Media and Poverty Reduction, Magda de Meyer, director of the ministry’s poverty initiative and Julien Van Geertsom, President of the Belgian Federal Public Planning Service for Social Integration.
The findings will be incorporated into a detailed report for government and literature explaining the studio process will be published.
The studio was expertly facilitated by Alain Wouters, a management consultant with whom David discussed the applicability of the studio technique to a variety of aspects of Equilibrium’s work and the development of organizational strategy which is becoming increasingly important as more external demands are made on the small team.
During the visit, David also met with Mr. Van Geertsom to discuss EQ’s participation in a programme that focuses on Belgium’s Roma many of whom originate from SEE.
Representatives of Cedar Foundation from the town of Kyustendil visit to exchange experience with Equilibrium
On 10 and 11 November 2011, experts from Cedar Foundation visited the social services complex in Ruse to meet the team there and exchange experience in the provision of social services especially those, provided in the family-type home where 8 children from the Mogilino institution for the disabled, are now accommodated.
The visit was prompted by the participation of Cedar Foundation in Kyustendil in the closure of the home for mentally retarded children in Gorna Koznitsa. The foundation now manages a complex comprising two family-type homes for children and two protected homes for young adults where youngsters from the closed home in Gorna Koznitsa are accommodated.
The specialists from Kyustendil showed considerable interest in the complex and, more especially, the family-type home for the children and young people from Mogilino. The guests were concerned about problems relating to the education of the children with disabilities and the community-based services available and other rehabilitation options. We shared our experience of specialist services - biofeedback, physiotherapy and hippotherapy involving horses plus the more straightforward components of their individual daily programmes that include walks outdoors and visiting public places which assist their socialization and adaptation to life in the community.
Equilibrium’s programme for development of volunteers attracted the interest of Cedar Foundation. It involves the formation of stable relationships with partners with special talents or interests who contribute to the programme for children’s groups. We also discussed other forms of volunteering, established as a good practice in the complex – corporate volunteering and the involvement of students from some of the city’s schools who, among other things, are currently helping us to make cards for our Christmas charity bazaar.
We shared our mutual concerns about the insufficient financing for the provision of family-type accommodation and discussed the strategies of EQ and Cedar for dealing with this issue.
Our guests left happy with the information we shared and impressed by the list of services we provide.
Moldovan study visit to Bulgaria: 25-28 October 2011
In support of its British partner organization, ‘Hope and Homes for Children’ (HHC), UK and their implementing partner in Moldova ‘Children, Communities, Families’ (CCF), Equilibrium helped arrange a study visit for a group from Moldova designed to show current best practice in social and educational support and integration of children with special educational needs in the mainstream kindergartens and schools – a process in which EQ has long-term involvement.
The group comprised 16 people from 4 counties - senior representatives of several municipalities, directors of social services, education specialists, NGO experts and community social workers from Chisinau, Cantemir, Leova, Hincesti and Cimislia in Moldova.
The programme involved visits to facilities in three cities in NE Bulgaria – Ruse, Shoumen and Varna.
On 25th October the Ruse itinerary provided a comprehensive overview of efforts towards integration in the city’s education system with visits to kindergarten "Zora", "Angel Kanchev" elementary school (where specialists from the city’s Resource Centre participated) and the vocational school "Atanas Burov".
EQ has working relationships with all of these facilities and it is particularly significant that they have helped provide opportunities for some of the residents of the Small Group Home (the Pink House), which the delegation visited. Our Moldovan colleagues saw their individual programmes, educational solutions and achieved results. The programme in Ruse ended with a tour of the Complex of Social Services for Children and Families, where they exchanged experience with Equilibrium in the field of educational support and particularly, how the informal educational models are changing the attitudes of the children in the Complex and also the kids in schools, with whom Equilibrium works.The visit of the Moldovan delegation continued on the 26th October in the town of Shumen with meeting in the Municipal Directorate for Education Science and Youth Work. The guests visited "Sava Dobroplodni" secondary school and the daycare centre for children and young adults with special needs.
The study tour finished with meeting the team and sampling the work of ‘Karin Dom’ Foundation, in the center for children with special needs in the city of Varna.
Liliana Rotaru, Director of CCF shared: ‘We had the chance to see a continuum of educational services for disabled children from pre-school age to the young adults (kindergarten to vocational school), and how services compliment each other: school and day care, school and specialized foster care, foster care and daycare, services for children and adults, etc. All participants applauded the relevance and the impact of what they saw in Bulgaria.’
Furniture donation from the British Embassy
EQ has a strong working relationship with the British embassy in Sofia. As a result of the British government decreasing the size of its mission in Bulgaria, a sizeable quantity of furniture was sold but items remaining were available for donation and the Ruse complex benefited from this generosity receiving a selection of office furniture and equipment on 29th September 2011. We are extremely grateful and send our thanks to our colleagues at the embassy.
We launched EQ facebook page in Bulgarian in September 2011
Very quickly we found many of our friends. Now we can communicate, exchange ideas and information with more than 500 friends, supporters, partner organisations and colleagues.