01/02/2011 -- EvC Georgia has started activities on a new and exciting project Strengthening Child Care Services & Systems. This is an ambitious 3 year project, funded by USAID through UNICEF, and involves key actors of child welfare reform in Georgia; EveryChild, Save the Children, Children of Georgia and The First Step led by The Ministry of Labour, Health & Social Affairs of Georgia. Essentially this project aims to ensure that in a few short years there will be no more large scale residential institutions in Georgia!

The Government of Georgia is in the midst of reforming the child welfare system and is continuing to build on achivements to date in preventing the overuse of large-scale residential institutions for children in care by recently introducing a new Plan of Action for 2011-2012, entitled ‘Major Areas of Child Care System Reform’. This clearly and explicitly states that ensuring children receive care in a family-like environment is the overarching priority for child care services in Georgia in the coming years, thus recognising that the family environment provides the best care for the survival, development, safety and protection of children.  It is within this context that the project ‘Strengthening Child Care Services and Systems’ evolved, making the expansion, support and provision of alternative care services a key focus as well as prevention of family separation. To date there has been a significant reduction in children residing in insitutions, however with the planned closure of the remaining 20 institutions by 2012, affecting 1300 children, there is an urgent need to boost support for family reunification, Foster Care, Small Group Home services, and strengthen the gatekeeping mechanism to ensure children are not unnecessarily placed in alternative care. This initiative will also focus on strengthening community- based family support services and emphasize the inclusion of children with disabilities.

Within this framework, EvC Georgia has been tasked with three core areas of work covering Foster Care, Small Group Homes and Access to Social Benefits. The Foster Care component will include a large outreach, recruitment and training of foster carers initiative as well as contributing towards the development of an effective Foster Care strategy for Georgia for the coming years.  Within the context of Small Group Homes, EvC will provide technical assistance and training for caregivers of new SGHs to be established in 2011.  Lastly, via a network of mobile Social Workers, EvC will support the expansion and access to social benefits for vulnerable households through outreach activities. EvC will work closely with project partners to implement and facilitate all activities related to these core areas of work over the coming months. This project will help ensure that all vulnerbale children in Georgia can live and grow in a strong family environment in the future and will constitute a major achievement in the area of child welfare reform.