Strong Beginnings began as a Child’s i Foundation initiative in partnership with Ministry of Gender, Labour and Social Development, Alternative Care Initiatives, Makerere University Department of Social Work and Social Administration, ANPPCAN and Terre des Hommes Netherlands. The aim of the project was to prove it was possible to place children from orphanages safely into families.
Where they operate
Organization Type
Main Areas of Work
What They Do
Location
Uganda
Child’s i Foundation provided models of best practice in family-based ‘alternatives’ to orphanages. To date, the project has achieved:
- Transforming our 25-bed facility (Malaika Babies Home) to an 8-bed emergency centre.
- Setting up the Uganda’s first ‘Emergency Foster Care pilot’
- Placing a social worker in a district to run a long-term community foster care pilot.
- Supporting the Government to run the domestic adoption programme and placing 22 children into new adoptive families.
- Recruiting and assessing over 20 Ugandan families who have been approved to adopt and waiting for a baby to become available to be adopted.
- Proving that with good social work is was possible to trace and reunify children back into extended families.
- Running the Ugandans Adopt campaign on behalf of the Government of Uganda.
- Working with 18 orphanages in Kampala, Jinja & Wakiso to improve their social work to safely transition children into families. The training included a 12-day work shop, shadowing at Child’s i Foundation centre of excellence and mentoring to ensure social workers receive ongoing supervision.