Start Date: 07 June 2020

End Date: 29 June 2020

Time: 09:00 am – 12:00 am – 01:00 pm – 03:00 pm

Venue: Ansari-VTC and Mobile VTC of Islam Qala Township

Help, with the financial support of the European Union, UNICEF and its headquarter in Germany and in cooperation with the Department of Labor and Social Affairs of Herat Province, has recently run vocational and technical courses for extremely vulnerable and street working children or one of their immediate family members at Ansari VTC owned by the Department of Labor and Social Affairs of Herat province and Help’s Mobile VTC at Islam Qala township. Due to the outbreak and spread of the coronavirus in Herat province, these classes have been suspended.

Since the suspension of the vocational training classes, Help and UNICEF office have made great efforts to prevent the spread of COVID-19 among the street working children, as well as many efforts, have been done to prevent the returning of children on the streets. So alternative training, awareness, and counseling programs have been held by Help’s psychosocial workers and vocational trainers.

Fortunately, programs such as psychological, social, and health awareness and counseling by phone for the beneficiaries of Ansari VTC, sewing and production of masks by vocational trainers and beneficiaries of advanced tailoring and bag making courses, distribution of masks, and hygiene training on the street for street working children have successfully been implemented during COVID-19 pandemic.

Following up on the mentioned activities, for the month of June 2020, awareness sessions on COVID-19 and child protection were held for 600 street working children or one of their immediate family members at Ansari VTC and Islam Qala Township Mobile Training Centers for 10 consecutive sessions respecting all the health measures. To prevent the gathering, the beneficiaries were divided into small groups and each group received one hour of training per day.

Every participant received an amount of AFN 250 daily, total AFN 2,500 for 10 days of the awareness sessions as transportation cost aiming to avoid using public transportation and finally to prevent further spread of the COVID-19 Virus.

Also, during the awareness sessions, a total of 30 cases of suspicious persons among the participants were identified by Help’s social worker and refereed to World- Vision health clinic by coordination of Child Protection Action Network/CPAN for further treatments.

It is also worth mentioning that the beneficiaries received 2500 AFN cash support every month from the World Food Organization (WFP) for purchasing their food packages.

This program was held for two 10-days periods, 5 hours session per day for each week, for a total of eleven VTC classes at Ansari-VTC and 4 VTC classes at Islam-Qala-township.

The topics presented are as follows:

1- Day 1: Awareness Session on COVID-19:

Topics Covered: Information about COVID-19 Virus, symptoms and how it is transmitted to others, how it can be treated?, rumors about the Corona Virus, the effects of drugs on Corona Virus, and how to best feed adults and infants to boost their immune system during the COVID-19 pandemic.

2- Day 2: The Importance of Hygiene:

Topics Covered: Personal hygiene, benefits of hygiene, important tips for better personal hygiene, how to maintain personal hygiene at home, and community and at work? Especially during the COIVD-19 pandemic and maintaining health and well-being from an Islam perspective.

3- Day 3: Underage and Forced Marriages between Children:

Topics Covered: Definition of underage and forced marriages, the causes, and consequences, possible solutions to prevent underage and forced marriages, underage and forced marriages between children, The Holy Quran and Islam perspective in relation to underage and forced marriages.

4- Day 4: Gender-Based Violence:

Topics Covered: Definition of violence, explanation of Article 4 of the law on the prevention of violence against women, causes of gender-based violence, who and where violence take place?, how to identify violence cases and refer to relevant Govt. and I/NGO? and effective solutions to eliminate violence against women.

Day-5: Life Theater Show:

Topics covered: COVID-19, personal hygiene, underage and forced marriages, and gender-based violence.

Day-6: Unsafe Migration:

Topics Covered: Definition of migration, types of migration, safe and unsafe migration, causes and consequences of safe and unsafe migration, effective solutions to reduce and prevent unsafe migration.

Day-7: Child Abuse/ Harassment on the Street and Prevention of Child Labor:

Topics Covered: Definition of Child, child abuse, different types of child abuse, child carelessness, child exploitation and types of exploitation, types of hard work by children, introducing World Children’s Day and explaining the child protection system and effective solutions to improve the living conditions of children.

Day-8: Children and Addiction:

Topics Covered: Definition of addiction and its side effects, the definition of drugs and its types, different types of drug abuse, the definition of dependency and its factors, disorders caused by drugs, and addictive substance abuse.

Day-9: The Importance of Education for Children:

Topics Covered: What is education? importance and needs of principles of education, formal and informal education, principles of education, effective ways to improve learning, strengthening the mind and memory, factors that reduce motivation to study among children, basic principles of strengthening studying motivation, definition of intelligence, creativity and different attitudes to intelligence, creativity, characteristics of creative people and the needs for fundamental changes in the education system to foster creativity among children.

Day-10: Good Parents:

Topics Covered: Importance and necessity of paying attention to family, loving children and communicating with them from the perspective of psychologists, pathology in the family, the role of families in the psychological and social harms of children, important tips for having a successful family, learn how to deal with crises, what role does the family play in the health or lack of mental health of children? what are the personal characteristics of children grown up in careless families? characteristics of families who establish effective relationships with their children and the solutions to reduce social harms in their families.

All the above topics presented with real examples, showing motivational video clips, pictures, and recreational activities such as theater programs and jokes related to the topics have been done by psychosocial workers in collaboration with the general education and hygiene trainers.

The awareness sessions ended with the full satisfaction of the beneficiaries and they ensured that have learned and fully enjoyed the session as well as taught the same topics to their family members. These sessions have had very positive effects on themselves and their families while dealing with social issues. The majority of mothers who had less awareness about their role and responsibilities upon their children promised to avoid repeating rude behaviors they had with their children in the past and promised to bring positive changes in the way of their life as well as paying more attention to their children in the future.

Source: Help Afghanistan IT & Public Relations Department