ROOF projects

Both in its orphanage programmes and at its Post-Orphanage Education Centre, ROOF’s goal is to do the following for institutionalized orphans and orphanage graduates:

• provide top-quality education (both academic and life-skills education) free of cost to this segment of the population to which it is often systematically denied;
• impart grace and peace through a support community which incorporates physical, psychological, emotional and spiritual support;
• enable institutionalized orphans and orphanage graduates to make wise, mature and healthy decisions for their own lives;
• surmount and eventually change the prejudice against orphans that is so prevalent in Russian society.
  

Specific goals include passing a wide knowledge base on to our students, keeping them from falling behind in school, broadening their horizons and promoting increased motivation, self-esteem and responsibility levels.

ROOF achieves these goals by being an active and alive support community through which our students have access to:

• High-quality instruction in basic school subjects;
• Mentors who help negotiate the storms of everyday life;
• Community activities that help them engage with their rich cultural heritage and Orthodox Christian faith;
• Educational opportunities and opportunities for creative development and artistic expression outside the institutional environment;
• Instruction in life skills and skills directly related to employment;
• Help in finding jobs and career training and counselling, especially for our older students.

Results

• Approximately 30 Post-Orphanage students have gone on to higher education including: Moscow State Pedagogical University, Moscow State Linguistics University, Patrise Lumumb Friendship of the Nations Institute, The Russian Academy of Sport, Moscow College of Business Studies, Moscow State Social University, the Tax Inspectorate Institute, various legal institutes.
• 21 students have completed their upper secondary education with ROOF. (ROOF has sent more students on to universities and institutes than have formally completed their upper secondary education with ROOF. This is due to the fact that in 2000-2002 we had a number of students who had already completed their upper secondary education (on paper) upon coming to ROOF, though their knowledge was incomplete and they required considerable further preparation before they were able to pass university/institute entrance exams.)
• 33 students have completed their lower-secondary education with ROOF at the Post-Orphanage Education Centre.
• About 30 of our approx. 100 college-aged Post-Orphanage students are from psycho-neurological orphanages where they were given no education; after being deemed unteachable by the state, about 20 of these students are working steadily through their primary education, others through their middle-school education, and one has already reached the 10th grade (of 11).
• In an average year at the Post-Orphanage Education Centre, more than 10 of our approx. 100 students will advance by 2 or more years in school.
• 8 of our Post-Orphanage students from psycho-neurological orphanages have had their diagnoses of 'oligophrenia' or 'weak-mindedness' removed, giving them the right to work and to receive housing from the state (like their orphaned peers without such diagnoses). If ROOF had not helped these young people remove their diagnoses, they would have been condemned to a life of institutionalisation.
• ROOF has the overwhelming approval of orphanage directors with whom we work.
• It is common for our orphanage students to complete more than a single grade/class of school in one 8-month school year when working with our teachers; this means that children who have fallen behind are, indeed, catching up with their own age groups.
• As a result of ROOF's relentless and long-term work to prove that the children in Belskoye Ustye Orphanage (Porkhov, Pskov Oblast) are teachable, in Sept. 2008 the orphanage became one of the first psychoneurological internats in all of Russia to open a state supported school for their 100+ children. Mornings of aimless wandering have now been replaced with lessons and a proper school curriculum!
• ROOF Abilitation Centre programme provides an alternative to adult institutionalisation for the graduates of Belskoye Ustye internat!
• As the news of ROOF's work spreads, so too do the demands for ROOF programmes. New orphanages are waiting to work with us; we can only consider this possibility if we raise the budget to start programmes in these orphanages. Click here to explore some of these opportunities and become a sponsor or member.

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