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Location

Melitopol, UKRAINE / Eastern Europe and Russia

Project Details

Helping Hands desires to run a program at the two orphanages it supports that will teach teenagers basic life skills they need to acquire before they leave the orphanage. The beneficiaries will be 17 and 18 year olds who are about to age out of the state-run orphanage system, at which time they must set out on their own. Most of these youths have virtually no concept of what will be required to secure work, housing, and food, and do not even know where to begin in trying to sort out these and other issues that will face them in the very near future.

The course will teach youths how to function beyond the walls of the orphanage, focusing on such topics as job-searching, securing and maintaining accommodation, cooking, finances, shopping, cleaning, necessary paper work such as taxes, and the like. The courses will be taught in small groups by Helping Hands staff, and will utilize a hands-on, engaged learning philosophy, allowing students to practice some of the tasks they must soon perform. The project price will cover the materials used in the course by the students, such as food for practicing cooking and $30 for every participant to deposit in the bank so that they can practice managing finances. The course will convene weekly, with 24 youths participating.