We learn to love at home. Children develop in healthy ways when they have a sense of safety. Safety comes from the love and belonging their families provide. When we separate or remove children from their families, we do lifelong harm to this ability to develop in healthy ways. That's why we're changing our model from a residential orphanage to a family-based care model. Our goal is to help keep families together and prevent child separation. When you donate, you change the world for a child.
In Uganda, at least 80% of children in orphanages have one living parent. So why are children in orphanages? Mainly due to poverty: the parents can't pay school fees and meet other basic needs, early pregnancies, early forced marriages can leave children on the streets. These children need to get back into safe families. We can safeguard children by supporting this approach that prioritizes families and doesn't remove children.
We know now that a child's need to have an uninterrupted sense of love and belonging is necessary for healthy development, and orphanages cannot provide this. That's why helping children be in homes with their families is the solution. We help each child's family be self-sufficient with job skills training, child care, parenting and life skills development, and social workers to provide psychosocial support.
Children who grow up in families have better brain development, develop empathy and give back to their communities. This project will assist in reintegrating children from the orphanage to the family care model and community. It will enable vulnerable families able to take care of their children. Doing this work will prevent attachment disorder, heal the trauma caused by separation from their families at a young age, and give children a sense of belonging in their family and society.
