On June 5, ARC Fund organized the first regional conference on prevention though interactive non-formal education in order to bring together in Sofia representatives of leading NGOs from the Balkan countries to share their expertise in non-formal learning, a very promising new development in the area of preventive services. It was attended by professionals from Albania, Bulgaria, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Croatia, Macedonia and Serbia including representatives of international organisations such as OAK Foundation and Save the Children. The conference was part of the project “Prevention of real and virtual violence through interactive education in schools”, co-financed by OAK Foundation and EC Safer Internet Programme and implemented by ARC Fund and Association Parents.
The coordinator of the project Georgi Apostolov and the programme officer of OAK Foundation Presiana Manolova welcomed the participants and introduced the rationale of the meeting. Mrs. Manolova underscored the importance of building connections between NGOs in the area in order to build up the capacity of each organization and ensure that the voice of the civic society is heard by policy and decision makers.
Olivera Randjic from the Serbian B92 Fund presented their experience of using film-making in promoting the understanding of human rights among children as part of an initiative called “Free Zone Belgrade”. As movies as a medium are very close to the young people, they were very active in developing their own scripts but also in classes, when orifessional trainers use the medium to foster comprehension of complex social issues. Again from Serbia, Masha Avramovic shared her organisation’s experience in creating and maintaining a children club in Belgrade that successfully realized a number of truly child-led activities. As Mrs. Avramovic stated, child participation is a prerequisite for the development of authentic children’s rights culture, which is the mission of her organization C31.
Amelia Efendic and Eneid Hasanovic presented the initiatives of the International Forum of Solidarity-Emmaus, the biggest NGO in Bosnia and Herzegovina. They shared the good practices in using interactive methods with children as well as their difficulties in organising nationwide campaigns given the complex political system in the county. From Albania, Arbereshi Mushani presented the activities of Save the Children in the area of non-formal education and especially the ones targeted at improving the living situation of minorities from the Roma and Egyptian population and stimulate inclusion of the children into the educational system. Magdalena Asparuhova from the Bulgarian Centre for Inclusive Education presented a project implemented together with ARC Fund, which aimed to teach pupils how to carry out peer research. This approach is especially valuable in the area of Internet and use of mobile technologies because young people consider it “theirs” and feel uncomfortable talking with adults about it.
Last, Georgi Apostolov from the ARC Fund and Alexander Kumanov from the Association Parents presented the methodology “Prevention of real and virtual violence through interactive education in schools”. It consists of 2 trainers’ manuals with over 40 interactive lesson plans to be used in class to increase pupils’ understanding of online and offline forms of violence but also to increase their social and emotional life skills. Ralitsa Vassileva from Association Parents demonstrated one of the lessons in the methodology.
In the closing session, the participants discussed the possibility to disseminate the “Prevention of real and virtual violence though interactive education in schools” methodology in the region as well as the challenges of adapting such materials to the mentality and culture of the various nations that populate the Balkans. Through the day a lot of common issues and also many opportunities for future cooperation were identified, so new regional joint initiatives are forthcoming.
