The CARE project - Accompanying the Careleavers in a path of Autonomy, Resilience and Empowerment, is born from the need gained over the years of experience in the field to realize a specific training aimed at university students of the faculties of humanities, which can be a value added to work with minors in view of their exit from the reception paths. In the needs analysis phase implemented thanks to the CHILD.FOR.CHILD project coordinated by the 3P Cooperative and funded by the EU REC program, the implementation of a guide figure and support to the autonomy of the young people who, after having lived part of their adolescence in reception facilities or foster families, they find themselves having to face entry into adult life "alone" and most of the time without the tools necessary to cope with these new changes. This even more if we consider that in Italy, the boys who live within their families of origin, at the age of eighteen, are certainly not ready for an independent life. For this reason it is important to train professionals to guide young people on a path of autonomy, resilience and empowermnent, which starts from their entry into the reception structures or foster family, and continues even after their exit, as points of reference for the guys out who don't have a family that can support them or that isn't adequate for that. The project involves the construction of 5 Intellectual Outputs: IO1: literature review of the models applied to the autonomy pathways in residential care for minors outside the family IO2: Comparative study and analysis of intervention models for the promotion of careleavers autonomy. IO3: creation of a tool that allows the analysis of the history and models of autonomy of the children received in the community and to identify protective and risk factors, in order to elaborate a personalized autonomy project. IO4: Implementation of a toolkit for the construction of pathways of autonomy resilience and empowerment IO5: Joint curriculum for the training of an expert on the subject of promoting autonomy Following are the expected results: 1. Training specific figures for the implementation of individualized autonomy paths of minors in communities / careleavers 2. Increase awareness of the phenomenon 3. Raising awareness of the governance for the implementation of policies aimed at careleavers and focusing above all on paths of autonomy 4. Implement operational tools for the implementation of training courses and their evaluation 5. Acquisition of new skills 6. Joint curriculum thanks to the implementation of an intensive study program (ISP) for careleavers: 7. Greater social inclusion 8. Decreased deviance and / or alcohol and substance abuse 9. Increased the possibility for the new adult to undertake more lasting training courses 10. Increased the possibility for the new age to enter the world of work 3 Multiplier Events will also be realized for the dissemination of the results achieved: the first in Spain, the second in Romania, the third in Italy The CARE project participants are distributed as follows: 1. researchers and specialized operators, as regards the study and implementation of the first intellectual output-30 2. University professors and trainers regarding the structuring of the training modules and their implementation-10 3. Political administrators, managers and managers of social services, reception and protection of minors, referents of guidance and employment centers, managers of residential structures, educators of residential units, judges of the juvenile court, foster families who in how much stakeholder will be involved in the various project phases, higher education teachers-300 4. Students and graduates from the universities involved (attending the short cycle, first, second or third cycle), and graduate professionals working at the involved partners and / or in other reception facilities. In the latter case, they must have a degree in one of the disciplines such as psychology, pedagogy, educational sciences-200 5. Minors in reception facilities and adults over the protection system-250
The main objective of the CARE project was to analyse the protective and risk factors of the autonomy pathways of young people in the protection system in order to identify paths, tools, and activities useful to improve reception and to prepare the young people for their exit. In addition, it is fundamental for these young people to create stable ties, to be able to count on reference figures who can follow them in their path to acquiring greater and greater independence, and therefore another objective was the need to train figures who could play the role of "tutors of autonomy", who could work in close contact with the young people, so as to actively involve them in the whole process. Research shows that residential care facilities for minors can contribute to the generation and reiteration of processes of social exclusion and stigmatisation of minors once they become adults. This means that if good work is not done inside, the children will not have found new resources and opportunities, resulting in an increase in deviance, substance and alcohol abuse.
The project CARE - Accompanying Care leavers on a path to Autonomy Resilience and Empowerment, stems from the implementation of the Child.For.Child project financed by the REC programme of the European Union. From the results of this project, some fundamental indications on working with minors outside the family had emerged, which led us to delve into this topic, especially with regard to the future of young people who at the age of 18-21 have to leave the protection system and face life "alone", without emotional, psychological, material and social support. Specifically, in the course of our activities, it had emerged loud and clear that young people were afraid of the future and lacked stable reference figures they could refer to in case of need. Hence a new reflection on understanding why some young people succeed, achieve independence, find work, manage to create a network around themselves, and others instead, perhaps even in the same conditions do not achieve the same goals. The aim is to understand what worked and what did not, analysing all those factors that facilitate the path and all those that hinder it. This was the basis of our project, research into the protective and risk factors of the autonomy paths of minors outside the family so as to better understand how to help them achieve their goals.