Refuseniks in hospitals. Abandoned children and their parents: who is to blame and what to do

Galina Aleksandrovskaya - coordinator for working with volunteers of the Charity Fund "Volunteers to help orphans"

Foundation Volunteers

A volunteer is a person who has the strength, the resources, and he spends his energy on something other than his main job and his personal life, and at the same time he has a great desire to help, that is, to carry out creative activities for free, for free. It is natural for me when people become volunteers. I have been working at the foundation for four years and volunteers are the people who surround me.

Our foundation is an organization in which a lot of volunteers work. It’s called “Volunteers to help orphans”. At first there was a movement of volunteers, and then there was a need to consolidate the legal status, and a fund was created. At first, there were practically no employees, but with the development of employees it became more. By the standards of NPOs, we are a large organization, and many functions - those that are performed by employees in other organizations - are carried out by volunteers.

Most of our volunteers, as in other charities. Non-profit organizations go to hospitals, go to children in orphanages, work with families, that is, they communicate directly with beneficiaries. But also we have many volunteers who perform administrative functions and work, which requires a lot of time during the working day. It’s almost a full-time job. On the one hand, it’s good, because it saves the resources of the fund, on the other hand, it often turns out that a person has too much workload. There are such volunteer positions where it is difficult to reduce the load, there is no way even to “break” it into parts and distribute responsibilities among several volunteers. In particular, these may be managerial, managerial positions. For example, we have a volunteer - an assistant to the coordinator of the project “Promoting a family home”, a volunteer - a coordinator of the project “Volunteer Care”. We also have a volunteer that has been working for a very long time, almost from the moment our foundation was founded, it has been engaged in our base of volunteers - it makes samples, mailings, and is responsible for organizing transport assistance. And her husband at one time created this base. We have an excellent volunteer dispatcher to receive and distribute assistance, she does a lot and is constantly in touch. In general, we have a lot of volunteers who are entrusted with important administrative and organizational functions.

The opportunities and responsibilities of the volunteers are very different. There are those for whom the responsibility is single-tasking, which does not reduce its importance. I can cite as an example a volunteer who posts information about our urgent needs on the main page of the site, or a volunteer who writes other volunteers for interviews with psychologists (who, in turn, are also volunteers). And there are volunteers who are offered a very big responsibility. They are like supporting stones: if they are removed, the organization will even be able to suffer for some time, until we find a replacement for these people. First of all, these are volunteers who are at the head of projects or occupy significant positions. For example, these are the coordinators of our institutions.

Volunteers of our foundation are people of different backgrounds. They choose activities and come to different teams. Usually, a person initially wants to help in a certain area, for example, to help children. And he may not be ready to help families or do office work.

The choice of a volunteer and its place in our organization is affected, firstly, by the person’s warehouse as an individual: does he like to work in a team, is he an individualist, does he want to work directly with children and families or is he attracted to mediated activities. Secondly, his abilities: he may be able to work only remotely or he can travel somewhere, he can join the work at any time or at strictly defined hours, etc. And thirdly, it is important which area is close to him: helping children and going to orphanages or hospitals, working with families, that is, mainly with adults, or helping with their professional skills, say, legal advice.

What do volunteers do with wards?

There are two projects in our fund in which volunteers communicate with orphans. These are the projects “Being close” and “Volunteer care”.

Volunteers of the “Be near” team go to orphanages in the Moscow region. They travel in groups, spend time with children, communicate with them, organize leisure activities, invite people who could teach children some skills, expand their horizons. It is very important for us that the people from this team constantly visit orphanages, so that communication with children is not superficial, so that a person becomes a child's friend. The ideal goal is for the volunteer to communicate with the child even after he leaves the orphanage.

In the framework of the project “To be near” there are areas - “Sociobeg” and “Distance Learning”. Volunteers of Sotsiobeg spend weekends training with children from Moscow orphanages. In the "Distance Learning" teachers via Skype deal with children from regional orphanages. This is a joint project with the Up Center.

All our projects are constantly evolving. In autumn, significant changes will occur in the project “To be near”.

The second team is “Volunteer Care”. Volunteers go to hospitals and orphanages for mentally retarded children (DDI) mostly individually, according to their own schedule. A person is focused on his activities, he communicates with children, provides them with the necessary assistance. In institutions, volunteers play with children, communicate, develop, provide non-medical care, and accompany during procedures. The types of classes and the ratio of care to leisure activities depend on the hospital, on the age of the children and on their diseases. But even where volunteers predominantly care, they communicate with children, teach something, are in no hurry, make it clear to the child that he is important and that they came to him.

We work in several hospitals and in two DDIs. In the latter, we are engaged in leisure activities - we play with children, conduct developmental classes, communicate, walk in good weather. Children - both toddlers and adolescents - lack regular communication because they are isolated. They have a different level of understanding, perception. We try to find an approach to each child, provide him with opportunities for development. It is far from always clear how much a child can get involved in a particular activity, what he likes and what doesn't. It is important in working with such children to be sensitive, patient, try different types of activities and interactions. Such children really need attention and positive emotions.

Our volunteers also visit the Mercy department, where there are children with a deep degree of mental retardation and serious injuries of the musculoskeletal system.

We have several hospitals - this is the Morozov Hospital, 6th Infectious Disease, GBUZ DGKB im. BEHIND. Bashlyaeva DZM ”(Former Tushinskaya), Moscow Regional Neuropsychiatric Hospital for children with central nervous system and mental disorders in Khovrino, Central Moscow Regional Clinical Psychiatric Hospital.

Two of our hospitals have children from zero to three. Developmental care is important in these hospitals.

We must understand that we come to orphans in hospitals, this is our priority. But there are also exceptions, for example, in a psychiatric hospital there are family children, often from dysfunctional families or from families that live very far away, and parents are not able to visit their child often. As a rule, children are in the hospital for a long time. Naturally, when volunteers come, they conduct activities with all the children.

People who go to hospitals are more individualists and carry out painstaking work with children.

Each volunteer is attached to a specific hospital or hospital, and each institution has its own coordinator. The task of the coordinators includes maintaining schedules for visiting hospitals. For us, the uniformity of presence is important so that there are volunteers every day.

A volunteer for a child in a hospital plays a role close to a friend, buddy. But here it is important not to cross borders. Children should understand that the volunteer is not a relative. But at the same time, he is not an employee of the hospital: he came to a specific child to be engaged, help, and pay attention.

It so happened that the team that goes to orphanages are people on average younger than hospital volunteers. Although we do not make any restrictions. I think that older people are sometimes not ready to join the team, discuss and come up with something, but they are ready to come to hospitals and deal with children strictly every week at the scheduled time.

Work with families

We also have such a special, difficult and very important area of \u200b\u200bactivity - this is “Prevention of social orphanhood”. The team of this project works with families on a technology called Case Management. We help families in crisis situations. Volunteers in this area are curators of families. In fact, they make the connection between the family and our foundation.

If a family turns to us in a fund, then our specialist employees get acquainted with the Net, try to understand the problems and needs, check how justified the request for help is. Based on the results, a report is written and a decision is made: will we help or not. In the case of a positive decision, a plan for working with the family is formed. Assistance to the family may be varied, for example: assistance in the restoration of documents, assistance with placing a child in school, clothing and grocery assistance, escort, etc. Next, we look for a family curator among volunteers. We have a permanent team of volunteer curators, which is replenished as necessary. It often happens that a volunteer curator is already engaged in one family and at the same time takes the second and third.

In the project “Prevention of social orphanhood” we have several employees. Volunteers of this direction are people with life experience, wisdom, and the ability to find a way out in different situations. These are mature people. Project staff support volunteers informationally and psychologically. Often for a volunteer it can become a problem that he plunges into the many life difficulties of his wards, it becomes difficult for him and he can burn out, he can leave, or vice versa, he can do all this to the detriment of himself and his relatives. Therefore, great attention is paid to working with volunteers. Meetings, supervision, trainings on burnout prevention are regularly held. The people who have been working in this project for a long time are already practically professionals, social workers. Work as a curator in this project is a lot of work.

Also, as part of the “Prevention of social orphanhood”, we have a project called “Warm Home” - a shelter for mothers with young children. In the shelter, volunteers provide one-time, mostly technical or economic assistance. These are people who bring material assistance, repair something, when there is such a need. Also, when required, moms are taught something. We are looking for volunteers with the right qualifications.

How else do volunteers help?

I’ll briefly list other projects of the foundation: “Children in Need” - assistance to orphans with serious illnesses; “Resource assistance to refuseniks in hospitals” - providing hospitals in which orphans are in the Moscow region and surrounding areas; “Territory without orphans” - assistance to the family arrangement of orphans by disseminating information about children, as well as by providing methodological and informational support to guardianship and guardianship authorities; “Close People” - assistance to families who have adopted children with developmental disabilities. Many volunteers in resource teams also help us: in the event team, in the PR team, in the Volunteer Center team, in the help reception and distribution team.

Volunteer Requirements

Our volunteers can be divided into three groups.

The first is people who do administrative work or work in resource teams. These are people who do not work directly with beneficiaries, but much depends on them in the work of the fund.

The second is volunteers working directly with beneficiaries.

The third - volunteers who help with transport or provide one-time help - distribute flyers on promotions, sew toys at our workshops or fulfill business requests - to assemble a closet, repair an outlet, etc.

Based on the types of activities of volunteers, we have different requirements and a different format of relationships. For example, all volunteers who work with children and families should attend introductory seminars and be interviewed by a psychologist. Hospital volunteers should also have medical tests. In some teams, volunteers must sign confidentiality agreements, agree to the rules, or contract with the foundation.

Volunteers who work in administrative positions or in resource teams, we rarely send for an interview with a psychologist and do not ask to conclude a written contract. Usually it is enough to reach an oral agreement when meeting with the coordinator or even while talking on the phone. For example, as a rule, there is no need to meet with a designer who is ready to make for us a layout of leaflets or other printed materials. You can talk on the phone, and then talk remotely.

The category that helps transport, provides one-time help, comes to our workshops, participates in our promotions - these are people with whom we do not conclude an agreement for a long time. We invite these people with the help of ads on the site, in social networks or through mailings and ask for one-time help. Often, regular volunteers from teams started with just such help. It is important for many people not to have a permanent responsibility, as they have no confidence that they will be able to provide assistance regularly due to workload or for other reasons. It’s easier for a person to provide one-time help and to feel involvement in our activities. In fact, there are also permanent people here, for example, volunteers who almost always participate in promotions, or drivers who can always help with transportation, travel regularly and whom we know. And there are people who have helped only once - but this is also important for us.

About motivation

Motivation of volunteers is very individual. When you talk with a person at an interview, it is important to understand his general mood, the reasons for his desire to help.

The resources of a volunteer in my understanding are free time and energy. This is a very important aspect, as there are people who want to help, but they really do not have the strength and time. The main resource is desire and motivation.

Each person has opportunities and resources, but each person distributes them differently, sets priorities in different ways. For example, some people think that if they don’t take a bath in the evening, then the day will not go well, and they cannot refuse it, and some people think that if they have free time, they can to help. Each person has opportunities and resources, but each person distributes them differently, correctly from his point of view.

I think that many people are uncomfortable living, even with material wealth and a high level of well-being. It’s uncomfortable to live, knowing that we have a lot of problems in the social sphere, which is bad for someone nearby. I believe that such motivation is correct. There is a common position that a person should not be tormented by the understanding that while he himself is good, someone at this moment is bad. They say that a feeling of discomfort is not a good motivation for a person to join a volunteer organization.

However, many come precisely out of compassion, out of a desire to fight injustice, and I believe that this is absolutely normal and natural. A person is satisfied when he feels that his help and participation can make at least a small contribution to changing the situation.

Some do not come with such deep motivation. Many young people are motivated by the thought, “why don't I go do something useful if I have the strength and free time.” Such motivation, when it’s natural for a person to help, is wonderful.

It happens that a person's motivation is clearly wrong. In this case, I can not just “weed out” a person, but talk to him and explain that the activities in our organization cannot give him what he wants.

It happens that a person is not resourceful. For example, once my grandmother called me, talking about her grandson, who is very reserved, who has problems, who does not communicate with anyone. She talked about how good it would be for him to come to us.

It is obvious to me that, firstly, this is the motivation of my grandmother, not my grandson. And secondly, presenting from the description of this person, I understand that he himself needs help. Maybe we will render it to some extent, but in reality, he will come, and we will not be able to give him fully what he needs. Sometimes a person is in such a state that helping other people will not have a beneficial effect on him, will not bring satisfaction. He must first deal with himself.

Our organization is not a rehabilitation center for those who suffer from loneliness or depression. We still have a different focus.

Although it happens that a person feels the need for a change in lifestyle, he goes to help and actually receives what he needed. But this requires a certain maturity.

I think that motivation should be directed precisely at the desire to give something, rather than receive. Naturally, when engaged in charity work, people have a positive return, but this is a bonus, not a goal.

It happens that people come who survived the tragic events. You have to be careful here. There is a recommendation of the Red Cross that if two years have passed after the tragedy, after the death of a loved one, then you can accept a person, it’s risky before. We, in fact, work with each case individually, do not set strict limits, but always talk to the person that volunteering can possibly harm him, the ward or our team. It happens that we do not offer work with children, but something else.

It should be said separately about the believers, or rather, about those who come to us (or to another foundation), because "the father said to help orphans." I know from experience that such people rarely stay. Too often, they perceive this as a punishment for themselves. And if not so, then often there is no personal desire, desire, but only submission to the priest. I emphasize that this does not apply to everyone: we have enough faithful volunteers in the fund, I am only talking about a specific type of motivation.

Students, when they contact us in groups, also, as a rule, do not linger. Students have their own schedule: sessions, vacations, etc. They need a "movement". Regular regular work does not appeal to them. I think students often make bad decisions. Like, shouldn't we go to the hospital? It is clear that the guys come from good intentions, but they just do not analyze how their life will develop further. Again, students tend not to make plans for a year or two in advance, they have everything changing.

We are not ready to work with those who have an excessive desire to satisfy their own ambitions. Ambition is good, but there should be a measure and a reasonable approach in everything. There are people who are completely absorbed in the desire to do something unusual, incredible, not the same as all volunteers do. I know from experience that such people do not want to fit into the structure of the fund and do not always accept that there is a person at each position, there are certain traditions, experience, rules, etc. They want to do their own thing with our help. Even if a person is really talented, we are not always ready for such cooperation. Such people do not want to understand that we do not have the opportunity, right after receiving an interesting offer, to start implementing it.

However, I never sweep such people at once. I try to find a common language with them, to choose options. Active and non-standard people make innovations in our activity, provide an opportunity to look at it from the side.

We do not work with those who do not follow the rules. We have experience and many reasons to have rules and demand their implementation. Not all volunteers understand the nature of certain restrictions, but they must trust us.

It often happens that a new volunteer, having worked a little with us, understands that his ideas about children, about the hospital, about the orphanage, about our organization do not agree with reality. And his motivation may weaken, fade away. It seems to him that he could not cope, he did not succeed, he is an inappropriate person, and nothing can be done with this.

Therefore, motivation must be maintained. One of the conditions for maintaining motivation is awareness and general, theoretical knowledge about who is being helped. I believe that the volunteer needs to be given as much information as possible.

Thus, it is very important for us to talk about where a person is going, what he will do, why we consider this activity necessary.

Responsibility and boundaries of volunteers

We do not allow ourselves to convince volunteers to do what we need, and not what they want. If a volunteer wants to help in a certain team, and all the vacancies are busy, then we can offer to try yourself elsewhere. We talk with such people, explain the situation, offer options, clarify preferences. We ask why the volunteer wants to work in a particular team or subgroup. Sometimes it turns out that the volunteer has the wrong idea of \u200b\u200bworking in one place or another. Perhaps, for example, a person does not want to wash the child and look after him in this way. At the same time, he has the conviction that only such work in the hospital. Or the volunteer thinks that he will be forced to do something unpleasant for him in the institution, and he wants to play football with the guys. Our task is to understand and find a compromise. This is not a conveyor, but an individual work with everyone. But if nevertheless it is not possible to offer a person a type of activity that satisfies him, we will advise him to apply to another fund.

When we accept newcomers, we say that a person can always contact the team coordinator or to me if something does not suit him. In this case, we will think what to do and how to correct the situation. It happens that a person does not fit the conditions that seemed acceptable at first. In this case, we try to find a suitable type of employment.

We always warn that we have specific teams, and the people in them carry out certain duties. And it is advisable to work in a team for at least six months. Naturally, this is not an official job and the volunteer can leave, take a break. However, I suggest people try to plan and decide ahead of time.

A beginner enters into a specific working group and therefore must determine the regularity and long-term nature of his assistance to us. We even draw up a schedule, if possible: where, how often and how a person is involved.

The volunteer in relation to the organization lives within, but within this framework he is free. He has his own responsibilities, which he takes, but also the freedom to express himself. All issues are discussed. Different teams have different boundaries, prohibitions, rules. We are happy for the creative initiative, but we also need to show reasonableness.

Of course, volunteers who perform administrative and responsible tasks have less freedom. There is creative work and functional, technical work. But there are volunteers who are looking for a particular creative work.

When volunteers do administrative work for a long time, the problem of fatigue arises. We warn candidates for such vacancies that the work is routine and requires a certain amount of time. It is very important to explain why work is ultimately needed, for what purpose.

The obligations of the volunteer, and therefore his responsibility, functions or results that we can ask him, are determined by a personal contract.

We train volunteers at seminars, give them guidelines, training manuals. We specify the limits of liability. Everyone decides what he can do for the organization, and this is his main responsibility.

If a person confirms his desire and takes up work, we count on him and wait for the results. If the work is not completed on time, then we turn to the volunteer - we remind that we expect the result, and then act on the situation. Sometimes a volunteer does the work, but with a delay. Sometimes helpers “disappear”, then you have to get out with other forces. In such a system of work, of course, there are risks.

Fund Responsibility

I am a supporter that everything should be spelled out so that there are job descriptions, rules, etc. In working with volunteers, we tried to introduce a system so that team coordinators fill out applications for the person who is needed, and everything that is needed is prescribed in the applications. Unfortunately, it didn’t work out. It is easier for the coordinators to write me a letter or call and say that you need a person to "do this and that." Often write or speak in general terms, i.e. not always thinking through everything beforehand.

Therefore, it turned out that my tasks may include not only accepting an application for a volunteer, but also forming a system of work: how much a person will be built into the structure, who will interact with him, who will give tasks (and whether there are any tasks), what will be the purpose of this volunteer and for which we will later say “thank you”, what will be his experience and satisfaction from the activity. I consider the study of all of the above as my duty.

It must be understood that the volunteer will do the work that he considers necessary. If there is no understanding of what and why is needed, there will be no work. I advocate that some of the routine responsibilities are shared between volunteers who are already engaged in certain activities in the team. For example, it is difficult to find a person who would ring people. Previously, there was an idea to find several volunteers who would deal with calls for different teams, but nothing came of it. Firstly, people did not feel they belonged to a certain team, secondly, the performance of the same function was not interesting, and thirdly, the final result of the work was not visible. Therefore, I try to discuss with the coordinators the responsibilities of volunteers, not only on the subject of the need for this work for the foundation, but also on the attractiveness of this work for the volunteer.

The volunteer should feel like a team, in live communication, he needs the support of a coordinator. We must tell the volunteer about the results of the work. He must understand what is built into our organization, and that his activities are productive. Bring it to the volunteer and my task and coordinator. On the site we post the results of the year: what we did, whom we helped, etc. I believe that this is also a responsibility to the volunteers: people should know what has been done thanks to them.

Team coordinators arrange informal meetings for volunteers, and twice a year we invite volunteers to general meetings. In summer it is a volunteer picnic, and in winter - summing up and celebrating the New Year.

Positive cooperation with volunteers requires psychological support and support of volunteers. We must take part of the responsibility for the psychological health of the volunteer. In particular, we must ensure the prevention of burnout. If a person has problems, he can contact the coordinator and ask for help. Our task is to provide consultants - psychologists.

We conduct seminars on the prevention of burnout according to different methods - game therapy, trainings. This is done by qualified psychologists, whose services we are ready to pay.

We also have a direction called “bonuses for volunteers”. We invite volunteers to performances and other entertainment events for free. We ourselves agree with theaters and other organizations, and the charitable assembly “Together” helps us a lot. Tickets are offered to the meeting and they are distributed among different funds. We have a volunteer who is engaged in "bonuses" and we are going to develop this direction in the future.

Organization of work with volunteers

It all starts with filling out a questionnaire on the site. Further depends on the direction chosen by the volunteer, and on the team where he wants to get.

For volunteers who want to work with families or children, we regularly organize introductory seminars where we talk about the features of working with wards, about the rules of teamwork, answer questions, and communicate. After the introductory workshop, it becomes clear to the person whether the proposed activity is suitable for him or not. Usually the introductory seminar is one, but for volunteers of the “Be near” team, we conduct 3-4 seminars. The first seminar is devoted to the problems of orphanhood, and subsequent seminars are held in the form of training, a lot of theoretical knowledge is given to volunteers.

Hospital volunteers after an interview are sent for medical tests.

After that, the volunteer meets with the team coordinator or group coordinator and gradually begins to practice. Sometimes a preliminary meeting is organized, but it happens that the meeting takes place on the spot in the institution. It all depends on the specifics of teamwork.

If we are looking for a volunteer with certain skills, for example, a journalist or a photographer, we immediately ask in the vacancy text that we receive feedback with examples of work or with links to work. If the professional level of the volunteer suits us, we contact him, give the task, and then there is already working communication. If the volunteer didn’t fit, we will answer him, thank you for the response, make notes in the database: perhaps this person’s skills will come in handy for us another time.

The volunteer often has questions, so the coordinators should always be open to communication. If a person is given a task, then you need to be in touch with this person - regularly be interested in how work is progressing, communicate, answer questions. This is necessary for a good result. It should be borne in mind that the sphere in which we work is very specific and not all people are easily oriented in it. Therefore, monitoring the execution of work is necessary, even if it is performed by a high-class professional.

I communicate with volunteers of my team on various topics, not only about work. Supporting informal relationships is very important.

Indispensable for volunteers is the support of the coordinators of their teams. If a volunteer comes to the team and the team does not communicate very actively with him, it may happen that a person leaves. Much depends on the charisma of the coordinator, his responsibility and involvement in working with volunteers.

As I already said, for volunteers who work in teams, we arrange meetings, training seminars, seminars on the prevention of burnout, supervision. Simply meetings are effective for meeting, socializing, discussing work and personal moments. They can be combined with training.

The volunteer works until he gets tired or until his life circumstances change. And then it can simply “disappear” or warn that it stops working with us. Often people say that their personal circumstances have changed. It happens that a person is tired. Despite the activities that we carry out, it is impossible to guarantee that fatigue will not occur.

Some volunteers are satisfied that they worked for some time for the benefit of society, and want to devote themselves to their favorite cause.

In any case, we always say “thank you” and “come back”.

The text was prepared by Julia Matveeva, Nadezhda Pushkina, Natalya Vorotyntseva and Yuri Belanovsky

Small hospital near Moscow, ward for 6 people. Outside the window, spring is raging. But the children here see the sun only through the window pane.

There is no one to walk with them. There is no one to love them. Sometimes there is not even a person who would simply pick them up, shake, walk ... Adults appear in front of them for just a few minutes: feed, change clothes, give medicine ...

These children are refuseniks. Those who did not find a place in their own family or in an orphanage. Double damned. There are not enough places in the children's homes, and sometimes it takes several years to wait in line. You can wait only here - in an ordinary children's hospital. Where the nanny is not enough even for “legitimate” patients ...

We know almost nothing about them. Only occasionally does information pop up about the outrages that are happening with these children: somewhere their mouths were sealed so that they would not cry, somewhere they were tied to a battery so that they would not fall. That, in fact, is all.

The problem of abandoned children living in the hospital has been hushed up for a long time, says Alexandra Ochirova, chairman of the commission of the Public Chamber for Social Development. - For the first time I became aware of her by accident, from mothers who were lying with their children in the hospital and saw these destitute crumbs ...

According to the law, when a child receives the status of “refused” in a maternity hospital or is removed from a dysfunctional family, he enters the hospital of a children's hospital to undergo an examination there, and then must be sent to an orphanage. But often abandoned children have been in the hospital for years - not for medical reasons, but because the child’s homes are crowded.

In hospitals, there are no additional staffing units (doctors, educators, nannies) for refuseniks - and the staff, with all the desire, cannot pay attention to them, walk with them, continues Ochirova. - Therefore, many children during their entire stay in the hospital have never been on the street, some do not even leave the wards.

Every day, refuseniks have a lesser chance of becoming normal people. Every day they, deprived of communication, are increasingly lagging behind their peers in physical and mental development. Often children get to the hospital healthy, but they don’t talk with the hospital syndrome, don’t smile, they don’t know how to play.

Children are always in bed, so it’s easier for maintenance staff to work with them, ”volunteers say, volunteers who help hospital babies. - Sometimes a special net is pulled over those who are trying to get up - so that they lie ...

It is absolutely unacceptable that the most important time of their development, when the foundations of the human personality, future destiny are laid, the children spend in hospitals virtually alone, ”explains the child psychologist Elena Loginova. - Indeed, immediately after the birth of the baby, the baby must develop the cerebral cortex, transfer to it the functions of grabbing, crawling, walking, etc. This can only be done with the help of adults. This work is so powerful that in two years of life, the baby’s brain weight doubles. Then this time is very difficult and sometimes impossible to make up for.

In the ward of the refuseniks of one of the hospitals near Moscow (I will not call her, so as not to incur bossial anger on the doctors), I appeared in a society of volunteers. These people provide all kinds of help - they bring clothes, diapers, toys. But the main thing is that they do not allow refuseniks to turn into “plants." They play with them, walk, talk ...

The volunteer movement is already three years old. Most volunteers are mothers who were once in hospitals with their own children.

We all have families, but we also find time for hospital kids, ”says Marina Andreeva, an active participant in the movement. - For example, now I am going to quit my job, since my husband is able to provide for his family. And then I'm sitting in the office with papers and thinking: “What am I doing here? Children are waiting for me there in the hospital. ”

Our appearance in the house of refuseniks causes joyful fuss. Some of the kids are reaching for us, someone is showing their wealth - a rattle, a bear ... The oldest in the ward, 4-year-old Sonya, hugs me as if I were the most beloved person in her life. I cautiously look back at the transparent windows of the chamber. I have already been informed that in most hospitals, volunteers and others like them take children in their arms and are forbidden to communicate. Why? Most likely the medical staff does not want to accustom children to their hands. But in this hospital, it seems possible. I take the girl in my arms - and in a moment I find myself kissed.
  I want to hand her a toy brought - a shaggy puppy, but Marina stops me. “Better give it to Natasha! Sonechka is already lucky - adoptive parents are already preparing documents for her ... ”

Adoption, guardianship, a normal family are the only salvation for such children, says Elena Alshanskaya, head of the volunteer association. - Who will grow out of the refusenik, who in childhood saw only the iron grating of his crib and the hospital walls? These children will not help the child’s home, even the best. Only a family!

Meanwhile, it is the refuseniks who find it most difficult to find a family. “Secret” hospital children are rarely adopted; nobody knows about them. And officials, as usual, have more important things to do.

REFERENCE “MK”
  There are no official statistics on refuseniks. According to the Department of Youth Policy, Education and Social Protection of the Ministry of Education of the Russian Federation, the number of orphans in hospitals, shelters and other institutions of temporary stay is 11,388. 11,388 CHILDREN NOW Lying under the nets over the beds! THEY NEVER SEEN THE SUN! THEY HAVE NEVER BEEN HUGGED BEFORE SLEEP!
  For example, in the Moscow Region, about 620 refuseniks live in hospitals. Only in one city children's hospital in Chita now 70 abandoned children live. In the State Clinical Hospital of Krasnodar - 35 refuseniks. In Yekaterinburg - 250, in hospitals in Novosibirsk and the region - about 200.

ABOUT FOUNDATION

Non-profit organization - a charitable foundation for helping children without parental care “Volunteers to help orphans” was registered in February 2007 and for the second year now it has been providing assistance to orphans and children left without parental care, as well as promoting family placement of children orphans.

The President of the Fund is Elena Alshanskaya. Fund grew from association of volunteers "Refuseniks"which for several years without premises and organizational expenses helped refuseniks.

The desire to help orphans united within the framework of the Fund completely ordinary people, people of different professions, ages, social status. Every day they find time to make their contribution to the organization of assistance for hospital refuseniks. However, over several years of charitable assistance to refuseniks in hospitals, it became clear to us that this is just a small link in a chain of big trouble - problems of social orphanhood in Russia, so promotion of the family structure of orphans is one of the primary goals of the Fund.

At the moment Foundation “Volunteers to help orphans”   helps 100 hospitals in Moscow, Moscow Region and other regions of Russia, which contain refuseniks. This is more than a thousand babies from birth to three years. Fund-sponsored babysitters work in 13 hospitals.

Within family work   the page “Children are looking for parents” has been created on the website www.otkazniki.ru, and a web-ring of sites of departments of guardianship and trusteeship is being organized. Over the past year alone, with the help of the work carried out in the Fund loving families found 57 kids.

With more information about Charity Fund “Volunteers to help orphans”   can be found on the website

Many people are sure that the child will not be happy with the mother who once abandoned him. Elena Alshanskaya, president of the Volunteers to Help Orphans charity foundation, working with such mothers, is sure that most of them are not monsters, but people who need to lend a helping hand.

Elena Alshanskaya. Photo: otkazniki.ru

Elena Alshanskaya - President of the Volunteers to Help Orphans Charitable Foundation.

Born March 2, 1979. Graduated from St. Petersburg State University with a degree in Philosophy. In 2004, Elena was lying with a child in a hospital near Moscow, where she first saw children - “refuseniks” and could not pass by. Together with other volunteers, Elena began to deal with this problem.

In 2007, the Volunteers to Help Orphans charity fund was registered, which implements programs to prevent social orphanhood, promotes family housing, and supports children in hospitals and government institutions. The fund has become one of the largest social projects implemented mainly by volunteers.

Pull the thread

- You joined the volunteer movement seven years ago. What has changed during this time?

A lot has changed, both in the life of the country, and in my life, too. During this time, we organized a rather large charity fund, which was not originally planned at all. Starting work, we did not even think that it was a long time and seriously. As my main activity, I was then engaged in completely different things, ecology, and some kind of creative projects. I had many plans, which are now very strange to recall. Then it seemed to us that there is a problem that needs to be solved and go home.

But the problem was not solved. More precisely, she unwound like a ball. It turned out that another thread was reaching for the thread and the end was not visible. But so far I haven’t done everything - you can’t leave! When we “pulled the string”, we gradually saw the whole problem.

Forgotten in the hospital

You started with children abandoned in hospitals. Where and why do they appear in our hospitals abandoned children and what to do so that they were not?

Children left without parental care appear in hospitals in three main ways. The most widespread way is the selection of children from their parents. The second way is voluntary refusal, the mother leaves the child, most often in the hospital, from there he is transferred to the hospital. Sometimes children are found on the street. It happens that children end up in the hospital after the death of their parents. If the child has lost his parents, or he is selected from the family before he enters the orphanage or family, he will be placed in the hospital for examination. There is no such practice in any country in the world, but we still have it.

And now the child who has just experienced the worst loss in his life, has lost his family, is in the hospital, in a place that is completely not adapted to help the child in this condition. They actually treat patients with the body, and do not help children with a heaviness in their souls to survive this stage with the least loss. There is really no one to care for the children in the hospital! And the child after the loss of a loved one is in a state of stress, this is a tragic, very difficult situation for him. So that she does not harm the child, she must somehow be compensated if some hands are released, others must pick him up.

I can say that over the past seven years, the situation of children in hospitals has changed. First of all, the material level has changed. At first we saw a blatant troubles - there were no diapers, the children lay on monstrous mattresses, suffered from pressure sores. This situation has been reversed, at least within the Moscow region. Those horrors that I just spoke of were left only in the photographs that we keep in the archives.

And the main attention that has arisen in relation to these children has given rise to many volunteer initiatives in different regions. But to say that the situation is resolved, we can only when we stop the vicious practice of keeping children who are not ill with anything in hospitals.

Pampers at the expense of the state

- Has everything changed with the efforts of volunteers or at public expense?

At first we bought diapers from volunteers. Then we managed, through negotiations with the state, to ensure that budget financing for these children appeared in the Moscow Region. Even the rates of educators and psychologists in hospitals appeared.

- You say: "we." At some point, people appeared next to you? Where did they come from?

“We” they appeared almost immediately as soon as I started talking about and writing about it. I began to write about this in the forums, in the LiveJournal.

- It was possible to somehow organize the people who joined you?

Somehow it happened that we got together, we decided everything together. And those whom it was impossible to organize, they somehow fell off at once. People came by themselves and said: "I can do this, I can do this." It is difficult to say how it all came out, probably just lucky, but we quickly lost a team that could make decisions and implement them successfully enough. We started going to hospitals together. We traveled to all hospitals near Moscow to help, who were there.

Then, we had a rather difficult period. It became clear that by bringing diapers to hospitals, we will not solve this problem; we need to change the very system of providing hospitals at the level of legislation.

The problem was that there was no budget for the provision of children in hospitals. There was nothing for them, except for beds. And there was no one to look after them, the nurses did not have time for these children. We realized that in order for funds to appear on diapers for refuseniks in hospitals, we need to go into dialogue with the authorities. And in 2006 we started a campaign in the media. We had a very serious discussion. We paved the way for journalists, but at the same time we didn’t comment or flash on the screen ourselves. Plots were shot completely independently of us.

At this moment, part of our team changed. Some people said they are not ready for this. They said that if we start to scandal, they simply will not let us go to hospitals. I was absolutely sure that even if we were not allowed to go to hospitals at the first stage, there was no other way than publicity.

We collected data on all hospitals in the Moscow Region, counted all the children, roughly speaking, “by priests”, and reported everything to the governor of the region. After that, a council was assembled from representatives of departments that are responsible for this. We have been friends with all these people for many years. And after that we signed a cooperation agreement. For this, we had to officially register the fund.

- What does cooperation with the Ministry of Health mean to you? Loyalty? Are you not saying anything bad about him now?

Why? Firstly, the agreement does not oblige us to silence. Secondly, we, in principle, never promised anyone to be silent. We only say that we are ready to solve these problems together. If we see that the problem is somehow not being solved, then we talk about it out loud, we did it, and we will do it.

- And in what year did the results appear in the form of financing, and so on, if you started this campaign in 2006?

In 2007, we registered the fund, and as soon as it was created, we immediately signed an agreement. It took about six months. In 2007, state diapers appeared in hospitals, and we have less work.

We began to collect money to pay for the work of nannies. Despite the fact that rates were introduced, they were very small, and there were practically no people. We took it upon ourselves. Then we went to the regions. At the same time, we had programs for family placement, we began working with “guardians”. At first, we somehow found it very difficult to find a common language with them, we gradually found. Then, at the very last stage, we had a program for helping blood families. To the same mother refuseniks.

- Did you learn something unexpected about people during this work?

At first, euphoria comes from the feeling that many people who are ready to act respond to a call for help. At first it seems that every problem is a wall of China, and you are alone with this wall, but it turned out that when you need help, hundreds of people respond. Suddenly they begin to say that they are ready to be your “arms” and “legs” - it was amazing.

The second major turning point was the understanding that blood families are not monsters, but people whom they all abandoned and no one helped them at any stage. Before that, it seemed to us that the most monstrous problem was the detention of children in the hospital. Institutions for orphans were also a shock.

- And where does the thread from the hospital lead to? To orphanages?

Then she leads to the orphanages, the next step is the orphanages, just as she can immediately lead to the foster family, and very rarely back to the blood. The thread always curls in different directions. At some point, we realized that the thread almost never unwinds, it does not come back to the tip where it started. That is, children almost never return to blood families.

Poor Nina

We did not see blood moms right away, and most importantly - at first for us it was such an unformed set of obviously "bad" mothers, such an image of a collective alcoholic. And for a very long time we had no idea what was behind the stories of the children before the hospital.

Our work with families began by chance. At first, we thought about placing refuseniks into foster families as their only way out. We perceived the blood parents quite negatively - after all, they either abandoned these children or mistreated them, so the children ended up in the hospital. And now Nina appeared on our horizon. The young woman stood idle for hours under the windows; she was not allowed into the hospital. The child was about six months old, he had terrible rickets and lack of weight, judging by the stories of the staff, they took him out of some brothel.

It is clear that the mother, who brought her child to this, did not cause us any sympathy. Nina found out that volunteers were going to the hospital, and began to ask us to talk to her. I was completely unprepared for this meeting, but, nevertheless, I agreed. I even tried to somehow prepare, managed to read the legislation to understand what to advise her, but, most importantly, I prepared a big accusatory speech.

Nina was a little older than me, a pretty woman of about 30, very poorly dressed. Soviet jacket, with patches, no signs of alcoholism, at least external.

Nina grew up in a provincial Volga city and was a late child, when she was born, her older sisters were already adults and married. Mom raised Nina alone. The girl was diagnosed with a weak degree of mental retardation in childhood. From the first grade, Nina did not pull out her studies and her mother took her to home schooling. So she studied until the age of 12, until her mother died. First, one sister took the girl to her, then another, but, apparently, neither there nor there she came to the court.

And at 16, Nina was alone in her mother’s apartment, which she inherited.

She worked as a cleaner, somehow lived. But one day I met a woman who said that you can sell an apartment and buy another, in Moscow. Nina agreed, she knew that she had an aunt somewhere in Moscow.

Nina wrote a power of attorney to sell the apartment, her friend sold the apartment and received the money. They decided to go to Moscow by train together, but the benefactress told Nina that there were no tickets to one car. They agreed to meet at some monument at the station. Nina stood there until evening, but no one came.

So Nina was alone in a foreign city, without registration. She poked around Moscow for a long time. Nina did not make the impression of a fool, rather, she seemed very naive. I was very struck that Nina, like Yeshua in “The Master and Margarita,” called everyone “good people.” She said about everyone: “They were so kind to me, they took me,” she was all good. And the woman who sold her apartment is also her “good” one. Nina still does not understand that she was deceived.

She got a job as a dishwasher in a cafe, and spent the night there. Then she met a guy. He had no education, at thirty he lived with his parents. Nina began to live with him, but then, when she became pregnant, his mother put the young people out on the street. Apparently, my mother was not at all happy with such a development of events. And so they were left alone, people with obvious mental problems. It was clear that Nina could somehow settle down. She worked, according to her, until her mother died - she even studied until that moment. At the household level, she certainly could solve problems. But in a difficult social situation, she could not find a solution.

They wandered with this guy. They were taken to live, now by one, then by other people. Pregnant Nina had nothing to eat. She said that during the three winter months they ate frozen potatoes and carrots, which they found in a cellar. It was their only food for a long time. The fact that a child was born problematic in this situation is not surprising.

The last couple of months they lived with some familiar alcoholics. However, the doctor from the clinic, who knew the conditions under which the family lives with the child, reported to the guardianship and the child was taken away. Nina immediately ran into custody. They told her there that she must first solve the issue of registration and place of residence, and without registration she would not be allowed to see her child. Naturally, for her and for the young man this task was completely unsolvable.

I had prepared two options for speech. The first is accusatory, while I listened to Nina, it completely fell apart, and the second option is a plan that needs to be fulfilled in order to return the child. But it also fell apart, because I saw before me a man who could not fulfill any of the points. At the same time, I understood that Nina is a good mother.

She doesn’t smoke, doesn’t drink, you can see from her. She loves her daughter and if there were people who could help her even with documents, then Nina and her boyfriend would be good parents. I sat next to Nina and understood that I did not have the opportunity to give up everything, to go home with her to recover documents and look for housing.

I told Nina what she needed to do, realizing that for her this information was meaningless, and she would not be able to implement my plan. So she walked under the windows of the hospital until her baby was taken to the orphanage.

After the incident with Nina, for the first time I saw that we did not have the resources to help blood families, and that when the next such woman came, we again could not do anything. It was necessary to prepare for a meeting with others. And we started to work.

Where do you get them?

We started working with blood families in 2008. Still poorly understanding how and what to do. Our first wards were mothers of children whom we saw in hospitals. We raked up the problems as best we could, simultaneously trying to understand what we were faced with. We got "head over heels" into a specific situation, and only then, along the way, we started looking for professionals, going to some meetings. Then there were no training seminars, we just went around the organizations and asked for help and taught us.

Honestly, we did a lot of unnecessary and unprofessional. And in the end, after a few years, we took shape both our approach and our understanding of how and in what situations to help.

Now we are working with mothers who, for some reason, have their child taken away, or they themselves think about refusing. Most families send us state bodies - commissions for minors, social protection agencies, guardianship. It is customary for us to represent guardianship representatives as villains who feel moral satisfaction when they select children. I fully believe that in such a position someone can really begin to experience such feelings. But most often the situation is completely different.

The fact is that at this stage the guardianship authorities have no tools to help the family, they might be happy to help, but this is not laid down in their functions, nor in the budget, nor in the law. The only real opportunity that the guardianship authorities have is to take away or not to take away the child. And if they see that the family can be helped, it happens that they turn to us. A significant part of the families came to us through custody.

The second source is the hospitals and with whom we cooperate. It happens that parents come to the hospital where the child is, as was the case with Nina. It happens that a woman in the hospital wants to abandon the child, but agrees to talk with a psychologist. In this case, someone from the staff can call us. Within the framework of our project “prevention of failures,” we cooperate with maternity hospitals and we have visiting teams of psychologists.

Sometimes problem families find us using the Internet themselves, or through friends and our former wards, in a chain.

One with baby

Over the years of our work, there have been a couple of stories about single dads, there were several complete families, all the rest, 99% of our wards are single mothers. The history of our wards is a story of the loneliness of people in the modern world. Previously, it was never such that a mother and a child were left completely alone.

As a rule, a family gets into our field of vision when the children are still small, and the mother is bound hand and foot by the need to take care of the baby. Sometimes this is a mother with many children with children of different ages, all of them require attention and it is very difficult for one adult to cope with them, for this you need to somehow build your life. We are talking about those mothers who have no relatives nearby who can help, or resource friends. People who have no one are the main factor of trouble. The lack of extra hands, an additional resource becomes a critical factor.

Most of our mothers are newcomers. Somewhere they have a family that will help them sooner or later. Any family is always much better than being alone in a strange city with a child in her arms. The newcomer finds himself in a rather aggressive environment, where he has neither survival tools, nor resources, nor the ability to rely on someone.

The usual story for us looks like this: a woman, came to work, became pregnant. Most often, at home, her mother is waiting for her with another, older child. It was in order to earn their living, our heroine and arrived in the capital. Now she cannot work, but she is afraid to confess to her mother that she is expecting a second child.

We are trying to help her get along with her mother. If relatives refuse to take her with her child, we find her some kind of support and housing in her homeland. We are contacting local state bodies and public organizations, and while negotiations are ongoing, we find this mother and child a temporary shelter in Moscow.

Then we send her to her homeland and control how she is there. We are also ready for some time until she can arrange a child in kindergarten and go to work to support her financially from here.

Summit

When we send mom and child home, we always try to find community organizations that will help her at home. Despite the fact that we are not a state organization, the very fact of a call from Moscow is usually enough.

And the very bodies of state protection that don’t lift a finger for their wards, very often precisely for the sake of “our” woman who “harness themselves to the fullest”, such a syndrome of a guest from Moscow, a VIP client. Once we sent one mother with a very difficult fate and problematic behavior. She did not have documents, and in order to send her, we had endless negotiations with various authorities, including the mayor of the city. And so, when she finally arrived, this mayor at the station met her in person.

This is our case.

When we started, we were ready to help everyone who turned to us. We quickly realized that, firstly, our resources for this are not enough, and secondly, we are committed to raising the material level of the family, although this family has no special problems besides poverty, and the children are well there. Children begin to feel ashamed of poverty later in adolescence.

Now we help only in a situation where trouble has reached a certain point, when it comes to refusal or that children can be taken away. In our society, there are two myths about such parents. According to the first, only finished addicts and alcoholics leave their children. According to the second myth, children are taken from a good, but very poor family, for no reason. In fact, all the stories happen somewhere in the middle of these two shores.

The press is very fond of writing about how children were taken from a poor but good family, which had no problems except for the refrigerator, which was not very full of food. I have never seen such cases with my own eyes. But I know many newspaper stories from a completely different perspective, and, believe me, everything is not so simple there. This is always a complex of problems. And, of course, selecting children is a poor solution to these problems. But in order to prevent this from happening, it is necessary to rebuild the work of the guardianship and guardianship authorities, to rebuild the system of assistance to families.

Of course, people who find themselves in difficult situations very often look marginal from our point of view. But very often this marginality is not their fault, but their misfortune. Assistance in such cases is usually complex.

A typical case is a graduate of a boarding school. Coming into a big life, they, as a rule, immediately have children. Most of the girls who grew up in trouble, trying to become adults, “play” this situation again and become a good mother for their children. But alas, they have neither external resources, nor, first of all, internal ones.

Our first task is to force the state to fulfill its obligations towards them. And the second is to help this woman become a better mother for her child than her mother was for her. As a rule, she has a faint idea of \u200b\u200bhow to take care of children, often she does not know some basic things, panic with the smallest difficulties.

The main thing for us is to create a supportive environment for the family for a period, usually until the youngest child grows up. The average working time with one family is from several months to a year. Sometimes mothers themselves say: thank you, help is no longer needed, we want to live like normal people. It happens that they turn to us again, we are ready to support, but these are, most often, some material things.

Heavy inheritance

Our work is presented like this: the family did not have a refrigerator, we bought it, and everything was fine. Or someone lost a passport, we helped restore it, and everything was fine.

Of course, there are situations that a woman gave birth to a child, and everything fell on her, and you need to help her a little while the child grows up, and then everything goes on her own. But with most of our wards, things are different. Because when a person has some minimal resources and knows how to build his own life, he usually does not reach the point of withdrawal or abandonment of children.

You need to understand that when a woman in a maternity hospital is going to abandon a child, this is already an extreme situation, not everyone will reach her. The same thing happens when some services are going to pick up the child: this, as a rule, is also an extreme situation.

Our wards are talking about complex ill-being. This is almost always a problem not in the first generation. Most of these people are children of parents suffering from alcoholism and drug addiction. Former graduates of orphanages. We can say that they have not laid the foundation for the correct construction of their lives, had no experience of normal childhood, and it can be difficult for them to pass something on to their children.

These people have a distorted picture of the world, a system of motivation. How does this happen? For example, like this: a child comes home with five, but dad is sober and evil, he doesn’t care, and tomorrow the child brings a deuce, but dad drunk and happy gives him money for ice cream. The child does not form any idea of \u200b\u200bhow his actions are associated with the consequences. Relatively speaking, he believes that it is not his actions that are important, but the mood in which Dad is now, and projects this system on the whole world around him.

These are purely social things that are formed, first of all, in the process of interaction within the family. Therefore, growing up, these people from our point of view often behave very inconsistently. For example, such people can become victims of fraud several times in a row without gaining any experience.

In fact, this is because they have a completely different mindset. But they are usually good manipulators, because they can read the emotional state of the interlocutor. In some cases, this strategy works, but in most cases, it doesn’t. And a person does not understand why everything in his life does not go well.

Most families simply do not see their situation from the outside. They notice that people are somehow wrong with them, but they have the feeling that everyone around is just evil and for some reason harming them, because of this, everything is so bad for them. Sometimes you have to teach adults to see such things, to plan a situation. Building disturbed communications is the work of a psychologist.

These people do not have the resource environment that can go this way with them, and we become such people. Parents, even if they are still alive, are more likely to be a burden than support. We are trying to do everything to give the opportunity to correct the situation and not get into a deplorable situation again.

Of course, these are not all families, all are completely different. And each situation of trouble is individual. The main thing is that there is someone nearby who will help and go this way together with the family.

We do not strive to "get into a person’s head", realizing that his troubles are partly due to the structure of his personality. Our task is to help him learn how to cope with social problems, to solve them in a better way than he can now - to teach him to communicate with social protection authorities, to assert his rights, to raise children without violence.

We give people tools so that they can build their lives. We can’t change our personality, therefore the level of his well-being is unlikely to be very high, most likely, he will be slightly below average. A person who was born in poverty and has not seen other examples does not usually become a millionaire, especially if he has not received a normal education. But, nevertheless, with our help, he will be able to better arrange the life of his child.

Prepared by Alisa Orlova

Galina Aleksandrovskaya - coordinator for working with volunteers of the charity fund “Volunteers to help orphans”

Foundation Volunteers

A volunteer is a person who has strength, resources and
  he spends his energy on something other than his main job and his personal
  life, and at the same time he has a great desire to help, that is, exercise
  creative activity free of charge, free of charge. It’s natural for me when
  people become volunteers. I’ve been working at the foundation for four years and volunteers -
  these are the people who surround me.

Our foundation is an organization in which a lot of work
  volunteers. It’s called “Volunteers to help orphans”. At first
  there was a movement of volunteers, and then there was a need for consolidation
  legal status, and a foundation has been created. At first, almost
  was not, but with the development of employees it became more. By the standards of NGOs, we are a large organization,
  and so many functions - those that are performed in other organizations
  employees, - volunteers are doing here.

Most of our volunteers, as in others
  charities. NGOs, go to hospitals, go to children in orphanages,
  They work with families, that is, they communicate directly with beneficiaries. But
  we also have many volunteers who perform administrative functions and work,
  which requires a lot of time during the working day. it
  almost full-time work. On the one hand, it’s good because
  this saves the resources of the fund, on the other hand, it often turns out that
  human load is too much. There are volunteer positions where
  it is difficult to reduce the load, there is no way even to “break” it into parts
  and assign responsibilities to several volunteers. In particular, it can
  to be leading, managerial positions. For example, we have a volunteer -
  Assistant to the coordinator of the project “Promoting the family device”, volunteer -
  coordinator of the project “Volunteer Care”. We also have a volunteer who
it has been working for a long time, almost since the foundation of our foundation, it
  engaged in our base of volunteers - makes samples, mailings, is responsible for
  organization of transport assistance. And her husband once created this base. We have
  a wonderful volunteer dispatcher for the reception and distribution of assistance, she does
  a lot and all the time in touch. Generally volunteers who are entrusted
  important administrative and organizational functions, we have a lot in our fund.

The opportunities and responsibilities of the volunteers are very different.
  There are those for whom the responsibility is single-tasking, which does not reduce its importance.
  I can give as an example a volunteer who posts information about our urgent
  needs on the main page of the site, or a volunteer who writes others
  volunteers for interviews with psychologists (which, in turn, also
  volunteers). And there are volunteers who are offered a very big responsibility.
  They are like supporting stones: if they are removed, the organization can even suffer on
  for a while until these people find a replacement. These are primarily volunteers,
  Heading projects or holding significant positions. For example, this is -
  coordinators of our institutions.

Volunteers of our foundation are people of different backgrounds. They themselves
  choose activities and come to different teams. Usually a person
  initially wants to help in a specific area, for example, to help
  to children. And he may not be ready to help families or do office work.
  work.

The choice of a volunteer and its place in our organization is influenced by
  firstly, the warehouse of a person as an individual: does he like to work in a team, or does he
  individualist, whether he wants to work directly with children and families or his
  attracted by indirect activity. Secondly, his capabilities: he has
  it may be possible to work only remotely or he can travel somewhere, he
  can get into work at any time or at strictly defined hours, etc.
  And thirdly, it’s important which sphere is close to him: helping children and going to children’s
  at home or hospital, work with families, that is, mainly with adults
  people or help with your professional skills, say, legal
  consultations.

Than volunteers
  engaged with wards children?

There are two projects in our fund in which volunteers communicate
  with orphans. These are the projects “Being close” and “Volunteer care”.

Volunteers of the “Be near” team go to orphanages
Moscow region. They travel in groups, spend time with children, communicate with
  they organize leisure time, invite people who could teach children some
  skills, broaden their horizons. It’s very important for us that people from this
  teams constantly visited orphanages,
  so that communication with children is not superficial, so that a person becomes a child
  buddy. The ideal goal is for the volunteer to communicate with the child afterwards.
  exit from the orphanage.

In the framework of the project “To be near” there are directions -
  “Sociobeg” and “Distance Learning”. Volunteers of "Sociobeg" spend on weekends training with children from
  Moscow orphanages. In the "Distance Learning" teachers via Skype
  engaged with children from regional orphanages. This is a joint project with the center
  "Up".

All our projects are constantly evolving. Autumn in the project
  “Being close” will make a significant difference.

The second team is “Volunteer Care”. Volunteers go to
  hospitals and boarding schools for mentally retarded children (DDI)
  mostly individually, according to their own schedule. Person
  focused on his activities, he communicates with children, provides them
  help needed. In institutions, volunteers play with children, communicate,
  develop, provide non-medical care, accompany during the procedures. Kinds
  occupations and the ratio of care to leisure activities depends on the hospital, on
  age of children and from their diseases. But even where volunteers are predominantly
  they care, they communicate with children, they teach something, they are in no hurry, they make it clear
  to the child that he is important and that they came to him.

We work in
  several hospitals and two DDI. In the last we do leisure
  activity - we play with children, conduct developmental classes, communicate, walk
  in good weather. Children - both toddlers and adolescents - lack the ordinary
  communication because they are isolated. At
  they have a different level of understanding, perception. We try to find an approach to everyone.
  child, provide him with opportunities for development. It’s far from always clear
  how much a child can get involved in a particular occupation, what he likes, and
  what - no. It is important to be sensitive, patient and try to work with such children.
  different types of activities and interactions. Such children really need attention and
  positive emotions.

Our volunteers also visit the Mercy departments, where
  there are children with a high degree of mental retardation and serious
lesions of the musculoskeletal system.

We have several hospitals - this is Morozov Hospital, 6th
  infectious, GBUZ "DGKB them. BEHIND. Bashlyaeva DZM ”(Former Tushinskaya), Moscow
  Regional neuropsychiatric hospital for children with central nervous system damage and impaired
  psyche in Khovrino, Central Moscow Regional Clinical Psychiatric
  Hospital.

Two of our hospitals have children from zero to three. In these
  In hospitals, developmental care is important.

We must understand that in hospitals we come to orphans, this is our
  a priority. But there are also exceptions, for example, in a psychiatric hospital
  family children also lie, often from dysfunctional families or from families that
  live very far away, and parents are not able to visit their child often. how
  As a rule, children are in the hospital for a long time. Naturally, when volunteers
  come, they conduct activities with all the children.

People who go to hospitals are more individualists and
  are painstaking work with children.

Each volunteer is assigned to a specific hospital or DDI and
  Each institution has its own coordinator. The task of the coordinators includes
  maintaining schedules for hospital visits. For
  the uniformity of presence is important for us so that there are volunteers every day.

A volunteer for a child in a hospital plays a role close to
  friend, buddy. But here it is important not to cross borders. Children need to understand
  that the volunteer is not a relative. But at the same time he is not an employee of the hospital: he
  came to a specific child to engage, help, pay attention.

It so happened that the team that goes to orphanages is
  they are people on average younger than hospital volunteers. Although we do not do any
  restrictions. I think that older people are sometimes not ready to join
  team, discuss and come up with something, but they are ready strictly every week in
  scheduled time to come to hospitals and deal with children.

Work with families

We also have such a special, difficult and very important
  the line of activity is “Prevention of social orphanhood”. Team
  This project works with families on a technology called Case Management. We help families
  in crisis. Volunteers in this area are curators of families.
  In fact, they make the connection between the family and our foundation.

If the family turns to us in the fund, then our
  specialist employees get to know her, try to understand the problems and needs,
check whether the request for help is justified. Based on the results, a report is written and
  a decision is made: will we help or not. In case of a positive decision
  a plan for working with the family is being formed. Help
  a family may need a variety of, for example: assistance in recovery
  documents, assistance with placing a child in school, clothing and grocery assistance,
  escort by authorities, etc. Next, we look for a family curator among
  volunteers. We have a permanent team of volunteer curators, which, as
  the need is replenished. It often happens that a volunteer curator is already engaged
  one family and at the same time takes the second and third.

In the project “Prevention of social orphanhood” we have
  several employees. Volunteers of this direction are people with life experience, wisdom,
  the ability to find a way out in different situations. These are mature people. Project staff
  support volunteers informationally and psychologically. Often for a volunteer
  it can become a problem that he plunges into the many life difficulties of his wards, he becomes
  it’s hard and it can burn out, it can leave, or vice versa, it can carry it all in
  damage to yourself and your loved ones. Therefore, work with volunteers
  Attention. Meetings, supervision, preventive trainings are regularly held.
  burnout. People who have been working in this project for a long time are already practically
  professionals, social workers. Work as a curator in this project is great
  work.

Also within the framework of the “Prevention of social orphanage” we have
  There is a project called “Warm House” - a shelter for mothers with young children. In the shelter
  volunteers provide one-time, mostly technical or business
  help. These are people who bring material assistance, repair something when
  there is such a need. Also, when required, moms are taught something. We are looking
  here volunteers with the right qualifications.

How else help
  volunteers?

I’ll briefly list other fund projects: “Children in Need” -
  help for orphans with serious illnesses; "Resource assistance to refuseniks in
  hospitals ”- providing hospitals with orphans in the Moscow Region and
  adjacent areas; “Territory without orphans” - promotion of family arrangements
  orphans through the dissemination of information about children, as well as through
  providing methodological and informational support to guardianship authorities and
  guardianship; “Close People” - assistance to families who have adopted children with
developmental features. Also many volunteers in resource
  teams: in the event team, in
  To the PR team, in the Volunteer Center team, in the reception team and
  distribution of assistance.

Requirements to
  to volunteers

Our volunteers can be divided into three groups.

The first is people who do administrative work
  or work in resource teams. These are people who do not work.
  directly with beneficiaries, but much depends on them in the work of the fund.

The second - volunteers working with beneficiaries
  directly.

Third - volunteers who help with transport or
  provide one-time help - hand out flyers on promotions, sew toys on our
  workshops or carry out household requests - to assemble a closet, repair an outlet
  etc.

Based on the types of activities of volunteers, we have various
  requirements and different format of relationships. For example, all volunteers who
  work with children and families, must attend introductory seminars and take
  interview with a psychologist. Hospital volunteers must also pass medical
  analyzes. In some teams, volunteers must sign agreements on
  confidentiality, acceptance of the rules or agreement with the fund.

Volunteers who work in administrative positions
  or in resource teams, we rarely send for an interview with a psychologist and do not
  please conclude a written contract. Usually enough oral achievement
  arrangements when meeting with the coordinator or even during a conversation on
  the telephone. For example, as a rule, there is no need to meet with the designer,
  who is ready to make for us a layout of leaflets or other printed materials.
  You can talk on the phone, and then talk remotely.

The category that helps transport provides
  one-time help, comes to our workshops, participates in our promotions - this
  people with whom we do not enter into a long-term agreement. We are these people
  We invite you through announcements on the site, on social networks or through
  mailing lists and ask for one-time help. Often regular volunteers
  of the teams started just with such help. It’s important for so many people not to have
  permanent responsibility, as they have no confidence that they will be able to
  Assist regularly due to workload or other reasons. Man
  it is easier to provide one-time help and to feel involvement in our activities. On
  in fact, there are regular people here, for example, volunteers who
almost always participate in promotions, or drivers who can always
  help with transportation, travel regularly and whom we know. And there are people
  who provided assistance only once - but this is also important for us.

Social volunteering is one of the building blocks of civil society! We are helping society to increasingly become a community of responsible people and less to be a biomass!

“Volunteering for Dummies” is an educational direction of the School of Social Volunteering. Volunteer movement "Danilovtsy" offers a series of copyright publications. Experienced, working today volunteers, specialists and experts share their knowledge, thoughts and experience.