ESC: Youth are the Colors of Life

When it was established in 2002 within the body of Social Services and Child Protection Agency then, Association for Supporting Individuals under Difficult Conditions aimed to provide support for children and young people living and working on the streets as well as their family members. In order to reach larger masses, it has expanded its target audience covering disadvantageous and financially limited children, young people and their family members. Since all its members are professionals, services are based on scientific information and consist of models implemented in European countries in particular. The most important feature of this main objective is to ensure that individuals realise themselves and become beneficial individuals for themselves as well as the society. Diversity of groups receiving service has also been improved in this process. Refugee children and young people have joined to children and young people who were exposed or pushed to crime, suffered neglect and abuse, and who lost one or both of their parents. In order to improve quality of the services provided by the association, protocols have been made with local governments and universities along with central administration, and action plans have been prepared together. Our association benefiting from support services provided by Turkish National Agency since 2005 has ensured that hundreds of young people and children from our country and other countries benefit from these projects. Youth mobility ensuring integration between European Union member countries and our country, which is the general objective of these projects, has been achieved. Attention has been paid to dissemination activities in order to ensure that these projects specifically reach our target groups. Outputs obtained for the resolution of social problems have especially been shared with policymaker institutions and organisations. Our association has been awarded for such projects by many institutions like Turkish National Agency, and this has led to an increase in our motivation. Good results have been achieved through the network we have created for our protective and preventive services that we still continue developing to especially reach disadvantageous and financially limited regions. As a result of sports and social activities we have organised for children and young people to withdraw from social problems, we so far have had 21 children with a European or World degree. It should be noted that the number of children benefiting from these activities reached 300 before the pandemic. By ensuring that young refugees especially benefit from our early parenthood training, it is intended to ensure that they continue their early marriages. It is ensured that children, young people and their families benefit from many services especially thanks to domestic and international partnerships we have built between 2005 and 2021. Many young people, who we have brought back to education, have benefited from services such as internship and supervision from these partner institutions. Children and young people have carried out joint activities since some of the camps we have been organising domestically were moved to international arena. Positive outcomes have been achieved from all projects that we have hosted so far, it has been ensured that young people voluntarily visiting our country still carry on their connections in our country, and accommodation and hosting continue when they visit our country. Of course, it has also been ensured that they become our voluntary ambassadors when they go back to their countries. It is a pleasant outcome that they host our young people visiting their country for different purposes or build marriage bonds with our own young people. Of course, ensuring that all kinds of prejudices give place to more meaningful outcomes, embassies in our country support our association, and they announce such results on their website should be listed among other major consequences. Goals we have achieved through the support provided by Turkish National Agency in every period have also got bigger, and this has also ensured newly selected goals to get bigger than ever. We are also proud that various associations that we have helped to exist also take our association as an example in such activities. We carry on the path of adopting the support given by objectives of the European Union for ensuring that financially limited or disadvantageous individuals in all countries have access to social and other rights. Bringing services especially to those young people who cannot access social facilities due to their illnesses has contributed to their recovery process. Social activities that we have organised in paediatric clinics for children with cancer have been appreciated by hospital managements.