A ray of sunshine for Hasenbergl

The Lichtblick (ray of sunshine) Hasenbergl institution is committed to helping children and young people from socially weak and un-educated families. To offer these children better future perspectives, the organisation provides a healthy basic provision and intensive educational support. A social training course with the focus on occupational ability rounds off the programme.

The aim is to accompany the children and young people in an independent, autonomous life. Each child should be able to attend the school that corresponds to their actual talent, and also successfully complete their education. This includes learning how to deal appropriately with aggression and conflicts. Each child should be given a realistic chance of a training place in the first job market, persevere with it and be sure to make a sound start in their working life. In addition, the children and young people are introduced to a healthy lifestyle which also includes the development of interests and sensible leisure activities. In order to also gain support for this in the families, the Lichtblick Hasenbergl also offers an extensive training programme for parents.

The

BOSSELER ABEKING CHILDREN`S FOUNDATION supports the work of the Lichtblick Hasenbergl organisation with a generous donation. In this way, the foundation supports the comprehensive educational programme of the institution. This includes daily educational support, parent training courses and an intensive, real-life, social training course with the focus on occupational ability. The healthy basic provision with lunch, fruit provided at break time, clothes, school requirements and if necessary the arranging of therapeutic help ensures that the children grow up healthy and are capable of concentration and learning.

The foundation helps: A school for Nateete

The village of Nateete, located in the Mubende district of central Uganda, has never had a proper school. Only a provisionally trained teacher is available to teach the children in a cramped, poorly equipped room. Most of the inhabitants of Nateete work as day labourers on a coffee plantation. They hope that through receiving a good school education that their children will have better prospects. However, no money is available for building and running a normal school.

This is where the BOSSELER  ABEKING Children´s Foundation is financing the construction of a school building comprising three classrooms, a large, roof-covered veranda and a sanitary unit. The church is providing the association “Kindern eine Chance” with the plot of land required for this.

The BOSSELER  ABEKING children´s Foundation is also covering the costs for employing four qualified teachers and one head teacher. The organisation “Kindern eine Chance” gets the parents of future children involved in the planning and running of the school from the outset, since sustainable school education can only work if it is supported by the whole family.

With social virtues against violence

For this reason, the Munich Youth Sports Association (Münchner Sportjugend) set up a relief fund as far back as 2001, which is used to finance membership discounts for children from deprived families. The initiative “Sport for all children” gives socially disadvantaged children a lasting opportunity to participate in a club sport. The BOSSELER  ABEKING Children´s Foundation has helped to promote the development of these children via the provision of financial support. Social virtues such as fairness, responsibility and standing by one another give particularly adolescents from difficult family circumstances with experience of violence new inspiration. The BOSSELER  ABEKING children´s Foundation hopes that incidents such as the brutal attack by adolescents at the suburban railway station in Munich-Solln can be prevented in future thanks to this and similar initiatives.

A school for Saldang

The village inhabitants wanted to give their children the opportunity to receive an education, whilst preserving the Tibetan tradition of their homeland at the same time. Until the end of the 1990s it was not possible for the children of Saldang to go to school. As far back as 1995, the Tibet activist Adelheid Dönges decided to help, her awareness heightened by a visit to the Dolpo region. Together with village inhabitants and the organisation Friends of Nepal (Freunde Nepals e.V.) she was able to found a school in Saldang. In 1999 lessons began with the school’s first pre-school class. Today, the Shelri Drukta School is home to two pre-school classes, the primary school classes 1 to 5, as well as the middle school classes 6 and 7. In addition to subjects on the Nepalese curriculum, the children are also taught their mother tongue, Tibetan.

The BOSSELER  ABEKING children´s FOUNDATION has paid the salaries for three qualified Tibetan teachers who are prepared to work in this inhospitable border region.

Dolpo house in the Tibetan children’s village of Ladakh

Many ethnic Tibetans of the Nepalese Dolpo region were unable to provide their children with a school education by their own efforts. For this reason, they have flooded increasingly into the refugee reception camp of Kathmandu in recent years in order to be able to accommodate their children in a Tibetan children’s village. For the reception camp the situation turned out to be increasingly more difficult, since it had no infrastructure for these children. Thanks to the cooperation with Saldang and the positive experience with the Dolpo pupils of the hostel in Kathmandu, a plan was developed to construct a house inside a Tibetan children’s village. The children’s village of Ladakh in Northern India proved to be particularly suitable for this, as this region strongly resembles the Dolpo region due to its altitude and remoteness and the Dolpo children are able to feel as if they are at home.

The BOSSELER  ABEKING children´s FOUNDATION contributed to the costs of the construction of the new Dolpo house in the Tibetan children’s village of Ladakh.

Creativity can only develop freely when playing

DOLPHIN THERAPY FOR SEVERELY HANDICAPPED CHILDREN

The American psychologist and behaviourist Dr. David E. Nathanson developed a unique form of therapy for severely handicapped children more than 25 years ago: the dolphin therapy. This is aimed particularly at child and adolescent patients who suffer from severe and complex diseases. In addition to serious physical handicaps, the diagnoses are characterised by psychological problems and behavioural disorders.

This is where the dolphin therapy starts: the patient and the dolphin are at the centre of the 14-day therapy. First of all, each child is prepared for contact with the animal from a platform. The dolphins, which live in a natural bay on the sea coast in accordance with the regulations on animal conservation, are capable of recognising the special needs of each patient, and approach him or her playfully.

DISCOVER THE JOY OF LIVING WHEN PLAYING WITH DOLPHINS

The children usually lose their fear of the dolphin quickly, and develop self-confidence. Direct contact between the animal and the children in the water then follows. Curiosity, and the possibility of communicating with the dolphin, awaken the vital forces and the joy of living in the patients. This motivates them to become more aware of the world around them. The qualified medical staff and therapists at the Curaçao Dolphin Therapy Center also care for the parents, who follow and support the activities.

Although the dolphin therapy cannot cure the physical illnesses, it can achieve sustained improvements. For example, the patients become increasingly more attentive during the course of the therapy, are able to concentrate better and make contact with others. Moreover, progress appears in emotional experience. Many children are able to signal enjoyment, to talk, or to overcome fear for the first time after the therapy. By penetrating the children’s isolation and promoting their capability for interaction, the therapy lays the foundation for traditional medical rehabilitation.

DOLPHIN AID MAKES DOLPHIN THERAPIES POSSIBLE

In the meantime, some 10,000 patients from 55 countries have been helped by the dolphin therapy. However, the financial situations of most families make it impossible for them to finance the cost-intensive treatment. The relief organisation “dolphin aid” collects donations for these families.
The relief organisation was founded in 1995 by Kirsten Kuhnert. Following an accident, her son was awakened from a coma by dolphin therapy. With the help of donations and sponsors, dolphin aid has meanwhile made dolphin therapy possible for several thousand handicapped children and their parents.

For further information on the organisation:
dolphin aid e. V.
Angermunder Straße 9 · 40489 Düsseldorf
www.dolphin-aid.de

SPECIFIC IMPROVEMENT OF THE PARENT-CHILD RELATIONSHIP

This makes it possible to integrate children into the advisory service through a number of different settings. For example, everyone involved can see, directly and in the long term, how the parents’ addictive behaviour is affecting the children. Consequently, appropriate assistance can be provided on a specific basis to improve the parent-child relationship. The focus is primarily on removing from the parents any feelings of guilt and fear, especially the fear of not meeting the needs of their children. Instead, they are to be encouraged and called upon, in concrete terms, to take over their role as parents and to accept the associated responsibility. It is obvious that this will have a positive effect on the children.

A further objective of the child support provided is for the children to be brought into the institutions so that the adviser no longer focuses his or her attention solely on the addict, but is also able to integrate the family as a whole into the support system. The knowledge and assistance provided by the educational specialist forms an important basis for this work.

Foundation finances a Part-Time position

To make it possible to employ this specialist, the BOSSELER  ABEKING CHILDREN´S FOUNDATION supported the creation of a new part-time position at the Condrobs drugs advisory service in 2007. The Foundation took over the staff costs for this position in the area of mobile child support.

In addition to creating the new position, BOSSELER  ABEKING offers each of its employees the chance to become personally involved: firstly, through spending a day as an observer with the Munich drugs advisory service, during which leave of absence is granted by the management board. Secondly, every employee at BOSSELER  ABEKING has agreed to sponsor a child.

Further information on the work of the Condrobs drugs advisory service:
Condrobs Drugs Advisory Service in Munich
Konradstraße 2 • D-80801 Munich

EDUCATION FOR CHILDREN – SUPPORT FOR FAMILIES

The organisation Plan International does all it can so that children have to work as little as possible and that they are no longer exploited. The objective is to make a basic education possible for children and adolescents and to bestow them with skills which are decisive for their further lives. This also includes helping the families to find alternative sources of income – for example by making very small loans available.

The BOSSELER  ABEKING CHILDREN´s FOUNDATION has undertaken four sponsorships via Plan International. Programmes are financed with these sponsorships, which are aimed at building up girls and boys and improving their living environment via long-term projects. For this purpose, the organisation supports helping people to help themselves and the active participation of all members of the community in the projects.