UCEP Nepal started Drop-In Centre on May 9, 2016, which has since evolved into a “Socialization Center” aimed at reintegrating children into their families and society through vocational training and education. This program is being implemented in partnership with the National Child Rights Council (NCRC). The Socialization Center can accommodate up to 50 children, and as of September 2024, it is serving 19 children rescued from the streets. The program’s primary goal is to reintegrate these children with their families, enabling them to lead normal and respected lives in the future. UCEP Nepal offers a range of services at the center, including education, excursions, extracurricular activities, vocational training, sports, music, and other recreational activities to support their successful reintegration.
Objectives of Socialization Center
- To enhance the quality of life of the disadvantaged through the light of education, training and decent work.
- Protection of children especially underprivileged and disadvantaged ones.
- Rehabilitation of children.
- Harm Reduction.
- Arrangement of basic necessities.
- Referral to socialization center and drug rehabilitation centers.
WE GIVE VALUE
- Participation of children: To ensure that children’s views are heard and respected while taking decisions on issues that affects them.
- Family is most important for all children: To promote family environment to the children for holistic development by strengthen the capacity of the families for their sustainability.
- Open to new ideas and innovation: To encourage critical reflection on involved course of action, as well as innovation of new concepts, strategies and methodologies to achieve our mission and objectives.
- Commitment to foster solidarity in the community: Our commitment to the most vulnerable communities is based on strengthening their capacities and opportunities as catalysts for their transformation of human change. We work towards achieving social, ethnic and gender equality by eleminating the causes of poverty and social inequality.
Socialization Center’s work can be divided into three key steps:
– Prevention (prior to and during the street life): set of interventions focused in two ways:
– Prevent and, if possible, avoid the arrival of the child in the street
– Create awareness among general public, the families and the children themselves on the realities of life in the Street (its causes, its daily routines and its consequences).
– Risk reduction (during life in the street): short-term perspective focusing on immediate reduction of the dangers of street life.
– Social rehabilitation (after life in the street): long-term perspective focusing on progressive and eventual reintegration of a child into society.
Activities of Organization
One of the major activities of the UCEP Nepal is to organize “Drop in Center/Socialization Center for Street Children”. Listed below are some activities held to accomplish Drop in Center for Street Children:
- Intake – Registration, health checkup, security check, sanitation check, new clothes.
- Provision of basic necessities – food, clothes, slippers.
- Education – Non Formal Education (NFE), Educational materials
- Recreation – Indoor and outdoor games, television, movies
- Health – Regular health checkup, referral to hospitals as and when needed.
- Counseling – Behavior modification counseling, reintegration counseling.
- Family identification – Initiate family contact through telephone and home visit.
- Special Reintegration service.
- Referral service – to socialization center and drug rehabilitation centers.
- Emergency services and awareness raising activities.
