In these years - thank to long distance adoption - life of many
children has changed

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Educate every child, in the family, in the community, in the world

"Education is a human right and a key factor to reducing poverty and child labour and promoting democracy, peace, tolerance and development". (Paragraph 36 of the Draft outcome document - as of June 29th 2001- A World Fit For Children)

"As agreed at the World Education Forum in Dakar…we will accord high priority to ensuring by 2015 that all children have access to and complete primary education that is free, compulsory and of good quality. We will also aim at the progressive provision of secondary education". (Paragraph 37 of the Draft outcome document - as of June 29th 2001- A World Fit For Children)

We must ensure free and basic education to all children:
this is the challenge of AVSI's activities and educational projects.

Foreword

The purpose of this paper is to present AVSI's educational activities in favor of children living their childhood and adolescence in armed conflicts, neglect and exclusion, persistent poverty and suffering from disease. Such activities represent the cultural and operational realization of the statements of UNICEF document A world fit for children, sanctioning the inalienable rights of access to basic education for every child.

Paragraph 7 of the outcome document states the commitment of the world leaders to education:

"We hereby call on members of society to join us in a global movement that will help build a world fit for children through upholding our commitments to the following principles and objectives:
(omissis)
Educate every child. Every girls and boys must have access to and complete primary education that is free, compulsory and of good quality as a cornerstone of an inclusive basic education. Gender disparities in primary education and secondary education must be eliminated.
(omissis)"

As documented by this paper, the AVSI's commitment in favor of children living in armed conflicts or in most deprived conditions, lays in the spirit of these fundamental declaration. Specifically we are going to outline the fundamental principles orienting our educational process, the resulting methodological implications, as well as the operational implementation of our interventions.

1.The Fundamental principles orienting AVSI's educational activities

The starting point of any activity in favor of children is the acknowledgement of their being persons. This definition recalls immediately the issue of identity and of building such identity within unfavorable or extremely difficult environments, such as it may be experienced in countries in conflict.

The personal identity is defined as "being in relation" with somebody else. This enables the person to structure and at the same time, to consolidate his/her uniqueness. In fact, the "identity concept" implies equality, equity, likeness (i.e. identification with) as well as uniqueness, specificity and diversity (and consequently building of the "I").

Therefore through and by means of relationship, the child is able to grow.
The growth process implies both:

the positive identification of the child's person (who is not completely defined by exclusion or deviance, often leading to violent behavior) and

the possibility to become an active adult able to take over responsibilities versus both other people and his/her own environment.

The personal identity is therefore the outcome of an educational process which finds its realization within a concrete belonging and can be experienced though interpersonal relationship.

Thus education is based on a mutual belonging, where the adult and the child find a symbolic and objective "place" to communicate themselves, looking with affection for the answer of the other. The child starts to be happy when he/she begins to perceive he/she belongs to, is of somebody.
To grow - and growth should not be considered simply in its biological aspects - every human being needs to experience a significant relationship, able to transmit the meaning of what one is and does. The parents are the adults to whom the child, in his/her quality of son/daughter, asks for education.

Hence education represents a strategic process by which the child may become an adult able to take over responsibilities and to face the great challenges of daily life even in a difficult environment. Such relationship can be established within a certain time and in a given space, in a home, through care, nurturing, play and company.

While stating the right of the child to education, it is therefore necessary to affirm the right of the parents to educate, to communicate a positive hypothesis of life.
Such rights of both children and parents are acknowledged and clearly confirmed by the outcome document in paragraph 31.
"Parents, families, legal guardians and other caregivers have the primary role and responsibility for the well-being of children, and must be supported in the performance of their child rearing resposibility. All our policies and programmes should promote shared responsibility of parents, families, legal guardians and other caregivers, and society as a whole in this regard"

2. The key role of adults as teachers

As so far pointed out, the balanced and stable growth of the child needs the presence of adults, the parents first of all, able to set the basis of and to orient the educational process.

The family is the primary point of reference for education. Such primacy is clearly underlined by the Draft outcome document, paragraph 6.
"We recognize and support parents and families or as the case may be legal guardians as the primary caretakers of children, and we will strengthen their capacity to provide the optimum care, nurturing and protection."

The family when present, must be supported to carry out its specific educational task at best, in order to favor building the children's basic personality.
In fact the personality building process is possible when the child, through family relationship, experiences basic confidence.
This is much more relevant in armed conflicts and in situations of neglect and exclusion. In these contexts it is very difficult to help children, because they are often wary of people holding any authoritative role, even a professional one, and fear relationships as soon as they get close. By reaction, children learn very soon to defend themselves, creating a barrier of wariness and cynicism and through improper behaviors.
On the contrary, when the adult is able to assure an effective "caring behavior", the child answers with confidence. This is the basis of any growth.
Confidence is the answer developed by the child if the parent or caretaker is trustworthy; and such a confidence is generated in a relationship context made of real actions. The outcome is a relationship context able to really take care of the growing subject and to start up a dynamic educational process addressed to the whole community
Besides parents, other adults have a key role in children's education: particularly in conflict situations, where they may be the only points of reference in the educational process.

The specific role and task of the adult in the education process consist of facilitating and promoting the recovery of the child's potential. In other words, children's growth and consciousness take place in a comparison, in a continuous relationship between the adult and the child.

The following three factors may well describe the teacher's position:

Authority and tradition
The consciousness of the whole reality enables the teacher to develop a complete educational project, sensitive to the daily challenges of the different environments. When comparing with the teacher, and his/her continuous valorizing capacity, the child grows, controls his/her own potential and learns how to read critically the situation where he/she lives. To reach this target, the first educational step is the attention to the life experience and values borne by the history from which the child originates (consciousness of tradition).

Self-consciousness
The teacher is such when he/she does not separate himself/herself from his/her own function.
The teacher is aware that true education comes from the communication of his/her person and that hence the first task is a personal and sincere commitment. The adult's freedom is always involved, in the absolute respect of the child's freedom. This approach affects any methodology or tools employed in the educational path.

Consciousness of the community dimension.
The community dimension is at the origin of any educational activity and expresses daily and continuously in a network of capillary relationships within the reference community.

Based on the above considerations, one may well understand how the development of a person is never involving only the child, but rather a common path of the child and of the caretaker
Such common growth marks the activity of AVSI's operators even in environments characterized by serious relational failures (absence of family, extreme poverty, weakening and destruction of the community safety networks able to substitute primary relationships). Moreover it represents a constant challenge and commitment of the whole person with relational resources, knowledge, affection, professional skill, time and life choices.

It is therefore evident that any educational task is not, and cannot be an individual undertaking, but rather the result of a common project. A project shared by the adults, who take freely the responsibility to implement it and which becomes immediately visible and recognizable in the social context. This visibility may set the conditions to favor the community participation to the educational undertaking.
In this perspective, education develops on a path leading from dependence to inter-dependence, where the former is meant as a condition of need, or lack of skill and autonomy, and the latter as the operational expression of adults taking over their own responsibilities.

3. Methodological aspects:
from the welfare state approach to a caring society.

In the most vulnerable countries marked by poverty, exclusion, conflicts, poor health, the risk of approaching children in terms of mere assistance is very high, due to the urgency, seriousness and magnitude of needs.
The educational path so far pictured is based on a unique method, characterized by the capacity to "take care" of the person, in this case of the child, in all his/her dimensions. Only as a consequence all needs, hindering the child growth, obvious and hidden, material as well as spiritual, are dealt with.
In this sense, there are aspects of reality, such as innocent suffering, disease and mourning that need to be shared inside a daily company which, while relieving pains, favors the recognition of the value of the person and, where possible, becomes able to identify answers to the needs.

The answer to the needs goes along with the consideration of the person as a whole, in other words it is global. Such an approach makes the action carried out both in favor of the individual child and of his/her living environment more incisive and effective. As already stated above, this method supports the individual child in building a positive personality; on the other side, as to the living environment, AVSI's method is particularly effective in reconstructing social links broken by conflicts and violence, in promoting the development of local communities, in generating or regenerating human social relations.

Specifically, the method featuring AVSI's activities may be summarized as follows:

An holistic approach
Designing a project aimed at meeting a particular need (disease, violence, conflict, exclusion), the person "object of the help" is set at the center of the activity with all his/her needs, his/her resources and taking into account the network of relationships where he/she lives.
This approach increases project effectiveness and, generally speaking, enables to reach more children in need and to assure the project sustainability in the run of time.

A "positive" partnership
The activation of the available resources and persons in the community means "to work starting from what is present rather than from what is missing".
The first resources are the children and adolescents present in the environment: the promotion of the positive aspects of the persons constitutes the positive factor in order to build or rebuild their individual identity.
These positive factors are also looked for within the family and the community, both considered by experience as a preferential "ground". Depending upon the specificity of each project, Institutions and Employers are involved in the educational, training and organizational processes, allowing the expansion and replicability of the original intervention.
AVSI's method promotes subsidiarity, a form of partnerships that, starting from an existing subject in the community, involves in the activities local administrations, other stakeholders, international institutions, all cooperating to the response of the needs they are faced with, according to their respective role,

Investing in the social and cultural patrimony of children and communities.
Many AVSI's projects are also aimed at decreasing vulnerability in high risk environments. This is achieved increasing the social and cultural resources of children and adolescents (improving primary relationships, training methodologies and social services delivery).