Five reapplying and three new projects were awarded grants for the application period of spring 2023

For the application period of 2023, five re-applying projects and three new projects were awarded grants. All projects promote children and young people’s rights to an education, have their fundamental righs met, and safer everyday life both online and offline Sweden and internationally.

All applications received during the application period were reviewed and thereafter underwent a selection process with the help of CATCH advisory board, which evaluated the applications and after which the board made a decision.

 

Three new projects were granted grants:

Superhumans with the project “Mental health and prosthesis treatment for Ukrainian children”

The Superhumans Center is a newly opened hospital in Lviv, Ukraine, specializing in providing state-of-the-art care and comprehensive rehabilitation services to people who have been affected by the war in Ukraine and need prosthetics – both soldiers, civilians and children. Ukraine has quickly become one of the most mined countries in the world; about a third of Ukraine’s surface is now contaminated by mines or unexploded ordnance, according to the country’s emergency preparedness agency. Everyone is affected by this, and among them there are many children who have lost legs and/or arms and who need prostheses. Unfortunately there will be more to come as it is estimated to take about 30 years to clear the country of the newly laid mines. The project CATCH supports will offer psychosocial care that a child, but also its family, needs when the child has received a prosthesis. The project also aims to train more professionals in rehabilitation and psychological support in Ukraine for future and current needs.

 

Childhood with non-earmarked support for ongoing projects in Ukraine

Childhood has been working in Ukraine for 18 years and has built a large network of partners with whom they have a long-term and close relationship. Primarily, they have focused on working to ensure that children can live in safe families instead of on the streets or in large institutions. During the 2014 crisis, they took special measures to ensure that the children who were forced to flee Eastern Ukraine would not be separated from their families and end up in orphanages. Today, Childhood works actively to get more people to pay attention to and prevent sexual abuse against children, as well as to strengthen the safety nets around LGBTQ youth and children and youth with disabilities – two groups that lived in great vulnerability even before the war broke out. In connection with the outbreak of war on February 24, 2022, Childhood intensified its work in Ukraine and the neighboring countries of Poland and Moldova. They have since had frequent dialogues with both current and former project partners who are all under extreme stress. On April 4, 2023, it was decided to intensify the work to protect the children affected by the war in Ukraine. The efforts are carried out in Ukraine as well as in the neighboring countries of Moldova and Poland, through the help of Childhood’s strong network of local actors that they have built up over two decades. This ensures relevance and sustainability as they know local needs and conditions – and they remain also after international attention has shifted its focus. As the needs are both acute and long-term, Childhood’s financial support will take place over time to ensure quality and sustainability in the efforts. CATCH and Childhood have a long-standing partnership and both have Her Majesty the Queen as Honorary Member of the Board.

 

Support to Ylva Mårtens to write a  book about “The child’s 1000 first days” in Swedish

An unusual decision, as CATCH does not usually support individuals, was to support the author Ylva Mårten’s project to write a sequel to the anthology “We must start with the children”. Through the sequel, Ylva Mårtens wants to try to circle the first 1000 days of the children; existential, philosophical, societal, in research, culture and history. Child researchers in psychology and cognitive research agree that a person’s most important years are the first three. At the same time, many who work with this age group believe that the young children in particular are neglected in research and in society at large. We never learn as much as we do then. We relate to those closest to us, we connect, laugh, cry, eat, sit, crawl, stand, walk, play and talk. This is when the foundaiton for our personality is laid, and the traumas at this age can be the ones that later mark us throughout life. Even in the first 1000 days, we have freedom of speech and other human rights – and we, the adults, must protect the freedom and rights of the youngest. We look forward to reading the book, which is planned to be published in the fall of 2024.

 

Five re-applications were granted extended grants:

Org 1825 – extended support for the project “Generation Resilience – important group conversations” in Sweden

The project “Generation Resilience – important group conversations” is a follow-up to 1825’s previous CATCH-funded project “Finally IRL! – important conversations in groups” which were carried out in 2021 and 2022. The main components of the project were the development of a pilot model for conducting conversation groups, method development, skill-enhancing webinars for professionals and working in partnership to lower the threshold for young people to seek support. In the follow-up project, they intend to build on and further develop these lessons learned and methods to reach young people with a higher degree of vulnerability factors, as research has shown that this means a greatly increased risk of long-term ill health and vulnerability. By reaching these young people early, this can be prevented, which means less human suffering, suicide prevention (in a group where the risk of suicide is several times higher than among other peers) and reduced societal costs for care and long-term exclusion.

 

Dara Institute – extended support for the project “ARTEIRO – Psycho pedagogical recreation for children” in Brazil

The Dara Institute receives extended support for its project in Rio de Janeiro where they work with vulnerable children’s individual psychological, motor, emotional and educational development. The project is structured in three phases: observation, diagnosis, treatment or referrals. Psychologists, educators and trained volunteers receive children and carry out playful activities that allow them to better understand the children’s emotional situations in a natural way, so that they can identify the children who need treatment. The children are then followed by an interdisciplinary team at Dara’s headquarters and, if necessary, referred to psychological clinics near their homes with close monitoring. Support is also give to the whole family in their interactions with their children to promote healthier relationships.

 

Futebol da Força – extended support for the “Mutola Cup; football for girls’ rights in 750 schools in Mozambique”

The Mutola Cup is a national football tournament inscribed in the school curriculum that serves as an educational platform and support structure for girls aged 8-16 to strengthen their health and rights in one of the world’s poorest countries, Mozambique. Through regular football training, conversations in the football team and with the girls’ family members, as well as through matches with workshops held by Futebol dá força’s certified non-profit football coaches, child marriage, teenage pregnancy and violence and sexual abuse are prevented. At the same time the girls get a support structure within the school system that ensures continued schooling, increased knowledge about girls’ rights that strengthens girls’ room for action and opportunities in life.

 

The rescue mission – extended support for “Solrosen”  (the sunflower) in Sweden

Solrosen’s target group is children and young people who have, or have had, a parent in prison or on parole. The situation for the target group is difficult. Research shows that these children are at a higher risk of developing mental illness, substance abuse, falling into criminality themselves and have difficulties in relationships with parents and classmates. At the same time, a survey from the National Board of Social Welfare shows that 8 out of 10 municipalities lack specific support efforts and that 9 out of 10 municipalities completely lack preventive work for the target group. Today, 30,000 children find themselves in this situation, and annually approximately 160,000 children are affected by a parent being prosecuted. Solrosen’s work is based on a proven model; The sunflower model, which consists of four themes that include support calls and outreach and information dissemination work in custody, group activities, text and music and finally support for other actors who come into contact with the target group.

 

War Child Colombia – extended support for War Child’s work in La Guajira refugee camp, Colombia

The crisis in Venezuela has been on going since 2015, and over five million people have fled the country. Around 1.5 million of them have made it to the neighboring country of Colombia, where War Child runs several projects. Colombia is still recovering from the sixty-year civil war that ravaged the country, and the huge number of refugees from Venezuela poses a major challenge to an already stressed nation. The project, which has been financed by Queen Silvia’s Foundation for three years, is aimed at children and young refugees from Venezuela, who live in a very vulnerable situation in Colombia. Through the project, children and their families are involved in War Child’s proven and evidence-based activities to strengthen mental well-being and keep children safe and secure from sexual trafficking and arms and drug smuggling. The project has been initiated in the province of La Guajira, next to the border with Venezuela, where War Child is one of the very few aid organizations active. The extension of support is part of War Child’s planned exit after building the capacity of local people to take over the project themselves.