Project partners:

Sdruzhenie “Shans i Zakrila” (Opportunity and Protection Association), Bulgaria

Amalipe Center for Interethnic Dialogue and Tolerance, Bulgaria

Cell for Alternative Youth Activities (KEAN), Greece

European Roma Information Office (ERIO), Belgium

Fundacio Privada Pere Closa, Spain

Ljudska Univerza Kocevje, Slovenia

Empowering Education Ltd., Bulgaria

Objectives:

• To foster cooperation between child protection, health and education systems, justice and police to coordinate their activities related to combat the early marriage among Roma communities applying Child-Centred Approach /CCA/;
• Raising awareness among different target groups in Roma communities in order to change their attitudes and behaviour regarding early marriage;
• To increase the practice at European level in the area of applying CCA to protect children from harmful tradition of early marriage.

Activities:

• Preparation of analysis reports in the partner countries regarding early marriages – legislation, guides of interaction, working practices of good inter-institutional cooperation;
• Preparation of a comparative report of the situation in the partner countries, containing general conclusions and recommendations, description of best practices and protocols of interaction for prevention of early marriages;
• Training of 150 professionals – social workers, teachers, medical workers, representatives of justice and police - to sensitize them to the effects of early marriage on child development and acquaint them with mechanisms for interaction based on Child-Centred Approach;
• Development of a training package for working with children and parents;
• Delivering awareness-raising training for 1 000 children with the aim of acquiring skills for protecting themselves from involvement in early marriage;
• Conducting “Schools for parents” - group work with 500 parents to develop positive parenting skills and raise their awareness of the risks and consequences of early marriage;
• Community work with 500 representatives of Roma community – family counselling, Family group conferences - for positive parenting skills to support the natural development of the child;
• Dissemination of project results - organization of 4 regional events in each of the partner countries, final conference in Brussels, project website, project brochure.

Period of implementation:

January 2016 – December 2017

Budget:

346 254 Euro.

Website of the project:www.empn-project.eu