Nurseries and preschools are not free in Romania, and the fees are too high for many poor families. Valentina Romania set up a preschool funding program that pays for some of the fees for selected families. If a child up to 9 years old does not to go preschool the year before first grade, he can not receive a Romanian public school education.

Our aim

• families in serious financial distress can send their children as of 5 to 6 years old to preschool
• parents are free to work or go to school themselves
• families have a better standard of living, and children begin to learn improved social values

How it works

The preschools send the parents in need to Valentina Romania or the Social mediator, another association, the City Hall from Sector 5, or even the neighbors of the families who are already in the program speak of Valentina Romania. The parents make a request to have their child go to preschool thanks to Valentina. Then the social assistants at Valentina go to the parent’s home and evaluate the situation through the ‘ancheta sociala’ (social investigation). According to the needs and whether or not the family qualifies, the child is helped to go to preschool.

Valentina Romania does more than just paying:

• monitoring the attendance and social integration between the children and the preschool
• working with the parents so that they get jobs, and helping with training them if needed

Results

• we help as many children as we can according to our funds, 60 in 2010-2011 school year
• immediate: children have a chance at education, they are qualified to enter first grade
• long term: children get used to schooling and integrate easily
• there are fewer children who drop out and more children get an education
• poor children have access to the same opportunities as children from other socio-economic groups