Annual Report
2014 – 2015
Ukraine, Zaporizhzhya
August, 2015
A Word from the Director
 The 10th Anniversary of our organization became the main event of this year. We started our work in two directions: preventative work with school students and educational sessions for seniors. Now we have grown into an organization that operates up to 10 different programs and projects.
This year the Florence Centre continued its work in all directions regardless of the difficult political and socio-economic conditions. In order to be able to function in such unusual circumstances, we made a decision to not discuss any tragic events happening in Ukraine at work. This decision was very helpful! Otherwise we would feel chronic stress even at work! Our favourite work, children of all ages, our successes and achievements, focus on the positive – all this helped us to overcome negative emotions!!!
This year our collaboration with schools became even more stable and long-standing; the boundaries of interaction within this school widened: now in addition to workshops and lessons for the children, we hold lectures for parents and teachers and also provide consultation to parents.
Our work with special needs children attracted many families and that was the demonstration of the quality of the service we provide. The creation of a self-help group for the parents of autistic children became our new direction of work. As before, among the new forms of work are lessons in the swimming pool and hippotherapy. As is tradition, much of the work with children is provided by students and volunteers. We are happy that after their practicum is over, students still come to visit us. That means that we got them interested in something! And they become our friends forever!
We continue to work in the direction of therapeutic guidance of the social sphere of specialists. This year for the first time we held Balint groups.
Our traditional annual concert, “The World of Big Hearts,” gathered a large audience and large number of participants!
There is a big emphasis made on the professional development of our workers. This involves participating in different online programs, in workshops, conferences and roundtables. There is also active sharing of experiences with other colleagues, including those from other cities.
We learned to do fundraising. Among most of our successful projects this year was a calendar with pictures of our workers with the title, “Angels of Kindness.” The proceeds from sales of this calendar gave children an opportunity to visit the swimming pool.
The most precious thing in an organization is people! Therefore a big emphasis is being placed on the nurturing of positive, warm and friendly relationships. Together we attend cultural and sporting events, read books and discuss movies. To put it briefly, we don’t have time to be bored! The main thing is to always have a life full of fun! Just like now!
Director L.Romanenkova
Social Actions
 From December to January our centre had a charity event called, “Angels of Kindness.” We created and published calendars where Florence Centre workers became models. All of the proceeds from this fundraiser were used for taking our children from the Kangaroo Program to the swimming pool.
We were able to collect enough money to provide children with an activity that would benefit their health for two months! Thank you very much to those who responded to our request and became a happy owner of a wonderful calendar!
This year once again the Florence Centre gathered all the friends of our sixth yearly integrative concert, “The World of Big Hearts,” which was held on April 23, 2015.
Our celebration united children of different ages and abilities. Hundreds of children went to a fun carnival that was organized by student volunteers. Crossword puzzles, labyrinths, ferries, bowling, arm wrestling, and hopscotch – those were only a few of the activities where children could test their skillfulness and keenness of wit.
For their efforts, the luckiest participants received tokens which they were able exchange for wonderful prizes: toys, colouring books, blow bubbles and balloons. There were also some unusual opportunities: an opportunity to learn to dance or do origami. For girls, our hairdressers braided hair, and for the boys, they did face painting. A happy gypsy was offering candies and fortune telling.
 After that, a concert was waiting for all the children. So many bright and little stars lit up on the stage that day! This year we had groups who participated before, but also those who had their debut performance. On the stage we had singers, musicians and dancers of special needs boarding schools, a college and a music school. As is tradition, the concert was opened and closed with performances of participants of the Kangaroo Program of the Florence Centre and the workers of the centre.
The group of animators along with a witty host helped to maintain a good mood between the performances with their short but funny plays.
At the end of the concert we had not seen even one person who was leaving the building without a smile and a good mood! We are very pleased with the fact that this year “The World of Big Hearts” became a territory of friendship, support and positive emotions!
The Program "Kangaroo"
 The "Kangaroo" program is a day care program for children with special needs aged from 0 to 6 years (autism, mental retardation, speech retardation, hyperactivity, Down syndrome, cerebral palsy). During the year 25 families attended the program. Work with children is carried out by different specialists – social pedagogues, psychologists, physical therapists, speech therapists, music therapists and volunteers.
During the year we conducted individual and group sessions - design, applications, puppet theater, massage, physical therapy, sports activities, classes on speech development, the development of the mental processes, gross and fine motor skills. Furthermore, the work included clowning, art therapy, music therapy, fairy-teletherapy.
Throughout the year, children weekly attended a swimming pool, in winter went to a sauna. They also actively participate in sessions of hippotherapy, and visit various excursions; for example, they travel to the district library, visit a stable yard, a pet store. Our kids performed on stage at the festival "The World of Big Hearts", became the real stars of the broadcast on local television. Our kids took part in a picnic on Khortitsa island, and visited Oak Grove Park. Such activities can not only promote a great charge of positive emotions, but also enhances a great experience of socialization and interaction with each other and with strangers. This allows the child to learn the rules of how to behave in public places and in the future to actively use those skills in practical life.
 During the year, our employees have actively cooperated with colleagues from other organizations and institutions, improving their professional knowledge and skills. We also conducted free massage courses for parents; our experts visited the Center of Social and Rehabilitative care for children with disabilities "Prometheus"; visited the Department of Rehabilitation of Disabled Children; and, attended a special school №3, participating in a round table of Zaporizhzhya Regional Council on the theme: "The integration of disabled children into the school environment."
This year, we paid special attention to education - organized and held a video conference with the teachers of the language center "Meridian"- Sevastopol, Crimea, on "hyperactive child"; participated in a conference organized by the library staff and dedicated to work with children with special needs; organized and held a forum for parents of children with autism; and, consulted with parents of children with special needs. One of the innovations of the year was the creation and promotion of social networks groups of our Centre (Kontakte, Facebook, YouTube). We have also received positive feedback of the work of the program "Kangaroo" from parents at the Zaporizhzhya sites.
In addition, over the years we have worked closely with volunteers who conduct individual sessions with our kids at the centre and at children’s homes.
 On our playground company "Poletechnika" established a high and beautiful fence, so that our walks with children have become safer. We also created a sensitive track for the children to train their walking acumin, made from various materials.
Together, with our children, throughout the year, we have cultivated our flowerbed - loose soil, plant and water flowers. The kids took care of flowers and other plants with great joy!
This year, we purchased a large number of new educational toys, which increases the opportunity to conduct role-playing games.
Extraordinary joyful for us and our children was to get musical instruments: maracas, glockenspiel, rattles, tambourines, harps, spoons, triangles. Children have a unique opportunity not only to develop their ear for music, but to actively participate in musical events, to learn the rhythm and had fun during music classes.
Another significant event for us this year was the opening of “the living cornero" - we became happy owners of two giant snails. Every kid having fun watching snails, feeding, caring for them - learning to love the world of nature.
Related to the situation in eastern Ukraine - our children, along with staff, decided to support those soldiers who are in the war zone. Children painted drawings were in which they depicted all their souls, love and a piece of heart. In addition, the program "Kangaroo" began to “adopt” a child whose family is displaced from the area of the war.
 We continue to actively cooperate with University students who were in our Centre for practice, and, we also became friends with students from musical school №1 - a group of schoolchildren who performed a charity concert for us - singing songs and playing musical instruments.
One of the brightest and most memorable events of the year was the joint production of dumplings with potatoes and cabbage by the children, along with the staff of the Florence Centre. Such activities promote the development of social and communicative skills, which opens unique positive qualities within each child, and, contributes to their development of perseverance and individuality.
And of course, this year we will, as before, remain loyal to our basic principle of love and kindness to every child. We try to give an opportunity to every child to develop unique skills in the atmosphere of comfort and warmth. And, we maintain that each of our children - a unique and gifted person - is necessarily helped by staff to reach his greatest success in their development.
Students’ Practicum
 It has been 10 years since our centre started to accept students – future social pedagogues and social workers for their practicum. This year has not been an exception.
“Most of all, I liked to work with children. I would love to work here.” These were the exact final words which were used in the practicum feedback by one of the social work students from the Zaporizhzhya National University. A week later we contacted her with an offer to join our working group and work with special needs children on an individual basis.
For us this is the whole point of the student practicum – to give them some skills, improve their professional level, cultivate love for their work and develop their potential.
This year we were able to accommodate 35 young people for their practicum: 30 students including social workers of the Economic-Law college of Zaporizhzhya National University (ZNU), two future social pedagogues from ZNU, two future social workers from ZNU, and one future social worker from Zaporizhzhya National Technical University (ZNTU). For some students this was not the first or only year when they had their practicum at our centre. They choose the Florence Centre as a place to acquire new knowledge and skills.
Students were especially active in organizing and preparing the “World of the Big Hearts” integrated concert. They worked on posters, came up with different activities for the children, prepared all the necessary materials, ironed the costumes – these were only a few things that the students were doing.
Invaluable input was made by these young people in working with special needs children from the Kangaroo program. From the words of the workers who are involved in this program, students’ attentive attitude towards the children, their participation during the time spent outside, and their presence during the sessions had a great impact on the children’s development. Little children play with the students with joy and excitement, and everyday eagerly wait for students’ visits.
At the end of their practicum, students shared their impressions with us: “Until this practicum I had no experience of close interaction with children. Working with them I learnt to be patient and more enduring. Also, I was able to apply my knowledge and acquire new ways of work.”
The students were not only helping with organizing and leading the sessions with school students, they were also involved with visits to the detention centre.
Some of the students decided to work with little children in the future, some of them decided to work with children who are older, and some of them picked the most difficult task – working with delinquent teenagers. When they come to our centre, each student gets the opportunity to experience different fields of work, but the main thing is to have a desire to try.
We want to mention that the students were successfully completing tasks placed in front of them, and improving their professional skills in that way. We are very grateful to all the students for the invaluable input that they bring to the work of the Florence Centre!
The Program “Healthy Lifestyle”
 The “Healthy Lifestyle” program is designed with the purpose of preventing negative developments in school life, facilitating a heathy lifestyle, and improving the psychological health of the school students, their parents and teachers.
We can openly say that from our 10 year history, this year was the most intense taking into account the quantity of sessions. Besides the “Stop HIV/AIDS” grant (where we conducted 100 sessions), we were able to hold 120 sessions with school students dedicated to other topics, as well as 10 group meetings with parents.
This year we paid special attention to improving the psychological health of school students, as this caused the biggest alarm among teachers. It is well known that friendly and warm relationships with school peers is one of the most important factors in a child’s psychological health. Therefore, an important goal of our sessions with school students is strengthening and tightening of a group as well as developing the skills of friendly relationships as a part of “Me + Others” series.
When answering multiple questions from teachers about the methodology of our sessions, we explain that this course consists of 10 sessions for one group. Usually this number of lessons is sufficient for getting to know each other, while not losing interest at the same time. Depending on the children’s age, the sessions could either take on a game or workshop form. In order to be able to give each child the maximum attention, each class of children is divided into two groups of 12-15 individuals. An experienced instructor then works with each of the groups.
We can definitely say that in all classes there was a positive dynamic in the shaping of interpersonal relationships. Children learnt to build friendly connections with their peers, to accept others the way they are and learnt to control their emotions.
Also, in order to make our sessions more diverse, we tried using different quests. This involved the whole class, and therefore facilitated unity of the whole group. This year our colleagues from the United States took part in our special events. At different stations, school students had to communicate with our volunteers in English and to learn as much as possible about them.  Considering the fact that our volunteers could not understand Russian, the school students faced not such an easy task. In the end, all school students completed their tasks with honours and received well deserved prizes.
Here are some of the comments of the children at the end of the course: “Who could have thought that I would be friends with K.! We were fighting all the time before!”; “I liked all the exercises! But especially the one when we had to build a tower out of paper. I have never done this!”; “During these meetings I learnt that some of my classmates are smart, and some of them are cheerful.”
We are glad that this year even more teachers asked us for help and participated during the group meetings with the parents. It is very important that the class would be a whole entity in teacher-children-parent relationships.Next year we hope to continue our close collaboration with all the schools!
The Project “Stop HIV/AIDS”
 For the period of almost a whole year, some schools of our city were participating in an interesting Ukrainian-Canadian project. Florence Centre workers raised the topic of HIV/AIDS which is a significant problem facing Ukraine. As the results of the school research showed, regardless of many lessons in different grades which are dedicated to issues related to HIV/AIDS, the level of awareness among teenagers in this area still remains quite low.
The main goal of the “Stop HIV/AIDS” project was to help the teenagers to protect themselves from this terrible disease, and to give them the correct understanding of safe behavior. This project was taking place from April of 2014 until March of 2015. During this time these sessions were visited by not only students of Grades 9-11, but also by parents, teacher and students of the universities. After the lectures led by the instructors, all school participants of this project received a set of materials on HIV prevention.
The sessions themselves were so entertaining, that the students did not even notice how fast they were learning important information. To fill out a questionnaire, to watch an educational video, to take an interesting quiz together with their classmates – this is not even a full list of the activities students had to complete during a lesson.
Our social pedagogues and psychologists who visited schools noted that the children took a sincere interest and were very active during the sessions. The most challenging questions for them were those concerning the ways that the HIV spreads. As such, a lot of teenagers did not know that HIV can be passed on from mother to baby.
Also, during their discussions it was common to hear the following comments: “AIDS is treatable; you just have to really believe in it!” and “The HIV vaccine exists already!” In one class after the session, one of the girls sighed with relief and exclaimed: “Now I don’t have to be afraid of mosquitos, because I know that they don’t spread HIV!” The instructors were asked dozens of questions, and in return, provided students with accurate information.
At the end of the course, students knew exactly what safe behavior was.
These sessions were useful for teacher as well. They were commenting with surprise: “We thought we knew everything on this topic, but these meetings showed that we also have blind spots in our knowledge! It was so interesting that we didn’t even notice how we started to play along with the children”.
As a result, the “Stop HIV/AIDS” project impacted 50 schools of our city. Its sessions were held in 100 classes which involved approximately 2,500 people.
Next year, the Florence Centre is planning to bring this HIV prevention project to the trade schools colleges of Zaporizhzhya.
The Program "Volunteers"
 The doors of the Florence Centre will always be open to new people who want to make the world a better place. That is why our volunteer program continues its work.
“I want to do something good for your centre, for the children. May I help with the Kangaroo program?” Those were the opening words of the volunteer T. We liked her right away – she is a sweet, open and friendly woman, who, regardless of her busy schedule, finds an opportunity to come and work with special needs children once a week.
And such cases are not a rarity. People of different ages and professions find their way to our centre. This year, as in the past, we had more than 70 volunteers who took a part in the life of our centre.
Volunteers are always ready to help. We were able to accomplish so much with them this year! Some of the volunteers participated in the sessions of the “Stop HIV/AIDS” project. Others expressed an interest in going to the Detention Centre to be a part of sporting events. These volunteers, along with the students of the school, participated with pleasure in the outdoor activities, cooking borscht and singing songs.
We try to find a task that would be specific to the interests of each and every volunteer. We are very excited to receive help from people who collect books and toys for the “Kangaroo” program, become a part of working with children, walking with them outside, and also helping with methodic materials.
Continuous communication with cheerful, smiling, and most importantly, friendly people makes the life of our children more joyful and interesting.
It was very pleasant to see familiar faces – volunteers had to reserve a spot to participate in the yearly “World of Big Hearts” concert. Most of them were part of this project not for the first, or even a second time. Volunteers knew and felt that they were extremely needed here.
Their help is valuable not only in physical tasks. Their mission is much more difficult – to give away a part of their soul to those who needed it the most.
Here we would like to tell you a wonderful story about volunteer N. She was helping in the “Kangaroo” program for three years, participating in all kinds of events. We saw how much energy, love and effort she was giving to the children, and how happy she was every time she would come to the centre. This is an example of when a person not only simply works, but gives away a part of herself. We were very happy when we got an opportunity to express our gratitude to our faithful volunteer and to hire her to work in the centre part-time.
We are always happy to see new volunteers! Welcome to our Florence Centre!
Juvenile Justice – Program
“We Are Just Like You!”
 The Florence Centre has been running the “We Are Just Like You!” program for six years. The main purpose of our work is re-socialization of teenagers from the Detention Centre, as well as informational and scientific-practical support of teachers and school workers. Over this time period, the form of our work has changed: from workshops, consultations and lectures for school workers and children to sporting events. Children get especially excited about the soccer tournaments between students of the Detention Centre and students of the Institute of Management and Law.
Besides soccer (which took place almost every time we came with the visit), we played volleyball and badminton. Children also had an opportunity to practice some gymnastics stunts on the bar, to learn some outdoor skills (portaging, setting up a camp, cooking borscht using a camp fire, etc.). On numerous occasions we celebrated New Year’s with the students. During the party, volunteers taught children some contemporary dance moves. We organized a few meetings with the international specialists for a discussion of healthy lifestyles in the U.S. This year we even learnt to make potato perogies altogether. And of course, all those perogies were eaten with great pleasure!! There was even enough to share with the school workers.
Besides events like these, we gave to the children mini-lectures on healthy lifestyles, why sports and physical activity is so important and how this knowledge will help them in their future life. After a variety of exercises, we drew their attention to how this would help them to become strong and healthy.
 The Florence Centre, together with the Department of International Tourism of the Zaporizhzhya National Technical University, is working on scientific research on the shaping and motivation of healthy lifestyles in teenagers. As a part of the research, we were observing and interviewing children and teachers, developing questionnaires for finding out what can help children to lead a healthy lifestyle. Thus we started to move from the empirical towards the scientific foundation of our work. We hope that the results of our research will be useful in working with children of similar circumstances, rehabilitation schools or correctional centres.
This year we were visiting this school on a regular basis. Children knew when we were coming and were getting ready for our visits. They were always happy to see us, no matter what kind of activities we were bringing with us. We also were able to notice progress in children: they were trying to be better, to win, to improve their skills, especially in soccer, so they could beat the university students. The winners would get certificates and were really trying to be the best of all! By the end of the year, everybody was trying to win!
In-service Training of Social Work Practitioners
 For many years already, the Florence Centre has worked with the Zaporizhzhya Municipal Social Services Centre in close collaboration. The foundation of this partnership is built on the idea of mutual assistance and support of specialists who work with different types of people, most of all with seniors and handicapped children. We were holding seminars, roundtables and conferences. This year we had a new direction in our work – Balint groups.
The goal of operating a Balint group is to encourage specialists in the appraisal of their interpersonal communication skills; work with their feelings; and prevent professional burnout. These are closed groups, which means that new people are not able to join the group once the work starts. The group consisted of 10-12 people, and by the end of the year this group had eight meetings (40 hours). With the second group, we had one theoretical and one practical session.
One concrete and very difficult case became the basis of therapeutic work. This case was worked on by all the participants. Through their questions and comments, all members of the group were helping their colleague to become aware of the problem, supporting him/her and working through his/her feelings by better understanding the problem.
Each time it became easier for the group members to talk through existing problems and to find out the answers to the current questions. This group developed trust and a willingness to openly discuss their concerns. Participants of this groups remarked on the high level of influence that the Balint groups had on stress relief, professional development, uplifting of mood and the creation of a team of like-minded people.
We are very happy that we were able to create an atmosphere of comfort and friendliness in this group.
As a result of the work of the Balint group, the specialists gained the skills needed to quickly deal with difficult situations, raised their self-esteem, and gained awareness of the fact that it is not only you who has difficult clients.
For us, this type of work was especially important because we were able to observe the high level of trust towards us, we witnessed the value of running the Balint groups, and we saw the joyful eyes of people after the sessions were over.
This kind of activity should be taking place every year!!!
How do you remember the last year?
The year was filled with a variety of activities that bring a lot of joy. And all of us were very happy!!!!!
Lyudmyla Romanenkova
This year is remembered by a large number of students, volunteers, parents, whom we were able to help and to teach. I remember the phrase of one of our clients: "The world is so unstable but here at your Centre it is so warm and calm! I just do not want to leave this place!"
Inna Belyaeva
"Fascinating! Never boring! Bright! Active! In one breath! Lots of experiences! Many new activities that I have not done before. "
Elena Ovcharenko
 "The opening of new horizons. Unexpectedly I began to lead a dance group on relaxation for the staff! "
Alena Sidorova
"Many of the goals that set were reached! But I have more ideas what to do in the future! Despite the fact that we have a war situation we try to be very positive at work. Love is present at work and in the family! "
Tatyana Rudenko
"So many things have changed in my life! I go to work with great pleasure. Day passes unnoticed when you like what you do. I have so much fun with small children! I give to them my love, and they gave me theirs! I want to help them. And anyway, I do not notice that they are not like others! "
 Irina Yushchenko
"It's very busy year in terms of self-education, training! I have become more tolerant to everything, more objective. I look with optimism to the future work. We believe in best! "
Maria Bespalova
"I have done a lot with my personal development . We have good relations in a team. Developing a resistance to stress. Hope for a brighter future: a new room, a van. And in general it is good, that something is happening. "
Dmitry Agafonov
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