Our First Ten Years • Recuperative Holidays • Neman Holiday Camp • Zhuravichi Boarding Home
Family Home 2000 • Rodni Kut • Mayflower Centre • Foster Care Training Programme
Children’s Hospice Care • Humanitarian Aid Deliveries • Special Class at School No 5
Vikov Home for Disabled Adults • Thanks to All Our Supporters

AS WE CELEBRATED the dawn of the Millennium at a party for visiting Belarussian children, Jean Holt expressed an interest in visiting Belarus. Jean had been the manager of a Children’s Home and then a Family Placement Officer and had a lot of experience in training foster carers. 
By mid January Jean was in Belarus visiting social centres and orphanages and in April she undertook her first training programme in Gomel. We were awarded a three year grant by the Department for International Development through their Health and Social Partnerships Scheme and this has enabled Jean to organise a great number of  week long training sessions.
She has worked closely with Geoff Wright, our Child Safety Officer, who already had experience of training in Belarus and Russia and many social work professionals from Leeds and North Yorkshire have taken part in the training. 
Directors and staff from Orphanages, Children’s Shelters and Social Centres throughout Gomel Region have benefited from these training sessions. This has resulted in more children being fostered into local families in this region than any other part of Belarus and has also helped to change the way staff work with the children in the orphanages.
A training programme at the Home for Abandoned Babies – followed by a visit the UK for some of its senior staff – has helped to transform the home into a much happier, brighter and more caring environment for the children.
There is still great demand for further training and Jean and Geoff will concentrate this year on preparing Belarussian professionals to pass on the training to others and also on a campaign to get children with disabilities fostered into local families. Besides training, this will also involve newspapers, leaflets, billboard advertising and TV coverage.