Region Plovdiv

Since July 2017 an Active Parents club is working in the Roma neighborhood of Stolipinovo. The club was created within the framework of the ZOV Project implemented by the Municipality of Plovdiv. The club organizes monthly activities involving both parents and children. A similar club was established in the town of Kuklen by activists from the Indi Roma 97 foundation.

Stolipinovo is the biggest Roma neighborhood in Europe and has a large number of issues accumulated over the years. In the two major aspects of its work – education and health – the ZOV Programme relies on parents’ awareness and active involvement in the educational process.

Roma parents, who took part at the club’s founding meeting, said that one of the major problems for both them and their children is the poor fluency in Bulgarian language. Therefore, part of the activities at the Active Parents club will be directed towards language integration of the parents; these include, among other things, visiting cultural and sports events outside the neighborhood, participation in public readings, organized for both parents and children, and providing assistance to those parents who would like to continue their education. Two-hundred parents from Plovdiv and Kuklen have been involve in these activities since the program’s start. Two-hundred children have been visited by the educational mediators, hired under the project; the same number of children participated in the extracurricular activities held in Lilia Kindergarten and the two primary schools "Kiril Nektariev" and "Nayden Gerov".

Currently, there are three educational mediators working in Stolipinovo and Kuklen. All of them are very well received by the local communities and are familiar with the existing problems of the local Roma families. Zinaida Karagiozova, one of the educational mediators working in Stolipinovo, is trying to convince Roma parents to enroll their children from an early age in the kindergarten. Another crucial moment in her daily work is the prevention of early school dropout. The second educational mediator in Stolipinovo, Ramis Sharif, was employed in September and is working with primary school students. The educational mediator Zlatka Yordanova works in the town of Kuklen with the local Roma children to facilitate their further integration into the educational system.  

In the beginning of September 2017 Minister of Education and Science Krassimir Valchev visited the intervention area of the ZOV Programme in Plovdiv. He was accompanied by the Deputy Minister Detnitsa Sacheva, the head of the Regional Governance of Education – Plovdiv Ivanka Kirkova, the Province Governor Zdravko Dimitrov as well as by experts from the ZOV Programme and various other institutions. The Minister visited “Nayden Gerov” School and “Lilia” kindergarten located in the Roma neighborhood of Stolipinovo where most of the activities of the Municipality of Plovdiv’s project, implemented under the ZOV Programme, are taking place.

Within the framework of the visit the Minister joint the mobile intervention team in Stolipinovo with the aim to include more local Roma children in the education system. The group met with a number of Roma families in an attempt to convince parents that regular school attendance is very important for the success of their children at school. In joining the mobile intervention team, the Minister showed his support for the work of social workers, teachers and experts who work to attract and retain children at school in the course of a national campaign.

According to the data provided by the Ministry of Education and Science, only in the Plovdiv province there are 13 500 children who are not attending school. This problem is particularly acute in the neighborhood of Stolipinovo and is one of the major challenges facing the local team of the ZOV Programme. In an effort to decrease the number of children dropping out of school, an educational mediator has been hired in June to work with the target group in Stolipinovo; the second educational mediator is to be employed in September. Such educational mediators work also in other five intervention areas of the ZOV Programme and the positive effect of their activities on the field is already visible. They are familiar with the problems of the target group since they themselves are part of the Roma community and therefore could easily find the right approach with the Roma parents and children. The educational mediators could become an important part of the mobile intervention teams that were set up throughout the country in an attempt to bring back the school dropouts whose number is over 200 thousand. The 6 mobile intervention teams working in Plovdiv are expected to visit 4615 addresses and talk with the families of children and young people who are not attending school.

“The occupation of the educational mediator will be included in the National Classifier of Occupations”- said in Plovdiv the minister of education and science Krassimir Valchev.

According to the ZOV Programme this was an important decision that would enable the educational mediators to work more efficiently in order to achieve sustainable results – a maximum school attendance of children from Roma community and other vulnerable groups.

Twenty-one teachers from Lilia kindergarten, Kiril Nektariev primary school and Nayden Gerov secondary school passed a special training in September on how to work with children from Roma community and other vulnerable groups. The educational mediator who was employed under the ZOV Programme to work with the vulnerable groups and teachers in Stolipinovo also participated in the training.

The seminar speakers were experts from the Plovdiv 2019 foundation, Equilibrium (Ravnovesie) Association and the Children Architecture Workshop organization; all of the speakers had a previous proven experience in the field of multicultural education.

During the seminar a number of good practices from the work of Plovdiv 2019 foundation with young people in Plovdiv’s Roma neighborhood were introduced. Another topic was the presentation of successful global approaches for working in a multicultural environment that could implemented in Bulgaria as well. According to the experts from Plovdiv 2019 foundation, a successful approach to the integration of Roma children and youth is their involvement in various stage performances such as participation in concerts, festivals and theatrical performances. The teachers who participated in the training had the opportunity to present to the audience good practices from their own everyday work with the Roma children.

During the practical segment of the two-day seminar the presenters from the Children Architecture Workshop introduced various games and plays helping to develop critical thinking and interaction with the environment.

The contractors for the construction of an educational center and a new extension building of the Iztok Healthcare Center in Stolipinovo have been selected. The biggest Roma neighborhood in Bulgaria with its fast growing population is in a huge need of new educational and healthcare infrastructure.

The educational center is to be housed in a multifunctional building with three premises, one of which will be used for sports activities and other public gatherings. The building provides for organization of extracurricular activities, joint activities for both children and parents and community meetings. A library will be set up as part of the educational center and public readings will be organized with the participation of both parents and children from the local primary schools “Kiril Nektariev”and “Nayden Gerov”.

The medical offices for a general practitioner, gynecologist and pediatrician will be situated in the new extension building of the Iztok Healthcare Center. The health mediator already employed under the project will have an office in this building as well. The increase of the number of medical consultations in Stolipinovo is foreseen under the project; this will include the consultations conducted by general practitioner, pediatrician and gynecologist as well as carrying out of vaccinations.

In the period January – June 2018, the extracurricular catch up activities in Bulgarian and some basic subjects continued in Kuklen as planned. 29 new children were enrolled in the educational institutions in Plovdiv and 97 were actively engaged in after-school work on Bulgarian language.

In order to increase children’s interest in learning, ZOV teachers employed various teaching methods such as didactic and mobile games, competitive games, quizzes, theatrical sketches and entire plays - eg. The Granddad's Glove, The Red Riding Hood, The Little Guest of Peter the Smart, The Wolf and the Seven Young Goats, etc.

Educational mediators helped hugely in organizing cultural events visits by coordinating the transfer of 390 children to the events venues and then supporting logistically the stay of spectators at the theatre. The children had attended the city’s cultural venues for the first time thanks to the project and as a result they would promote the visits to cultural events in their community and among their friends.

312 parents attended meetings and events and 475 children participated in catch up and and art and sports classes. 454 children and parents attended cultural events (theater and concerts) and 188 participated in sports activities. As part of an open lesson held in the presents of local parents, the mediator Zinaida Karagiozova has actively worked with the parents to get them involved in the educational activities along with their children.

Number of children in kindergartens (3-6) in newly established groups under ZOV, including groups for Bulgarian lessons - 76

Number of pupils (1 - 4 grade) in newly established groups under ZOV - 309

Number of participants (children and parents) in events - theatre, cinema and other culture & sport events – 578

Number of children in extracurricular activities (children & parents clubs, green schools, trips, museums) – 3 048

Number of parents in campaigns and consultations on education– 1 181

Note: Data covers the period 2016 – 2018.

The two health mediators, employed following a selection procedure in 2017, work actively in our intervention area in Plovdiv region – one of them work in the Roma neighborhood of Stolipinovo and the second in the near-by town of Kuklen.

The health mediators organize healthcare campaigns on different topics important for the Roma community such as family planning and methods of contraception, prevention of early pregnancies, children health’s problems, immunizations, etc. Before starting their work, both health mediators passed successfully a special training conducted by the National Network of Health Mediators.

For the period January – June 2017 the health mediator in Stolipinovo conducted 41 individual and 8 group consultations. The building of the healthcare center with an office for the healthcare mediators is planned to be finished by the end of 2017.

Mariana Rangelova, the health mediator in the town of Kuklen, is familiar with the local needs and is trusted by the local Roma community. Her efforts in overcoming the negative stereotypes, existing in the community, against the immunizations as well as her determination in solving the healthcare problems of the Roma people in Kuklen already brought about the first results. The health mediator in Kuklen conducted 55 individual and 33 group consultations for the period from January to July 2017.   

In September 2017, the health mediator Mariana organized in Kuklen a healthcare information campaign for the benefits of regular immunizations.

In the period January – June 2018, more than 1,250 individual consultations on family planning, primary healthcare and maternal and child health were conducted by health mediators in Stolipinovo neighborhood (Plovdiv) and in Kuklen.

For the same period 370 women had a gynecological exam (in total 531 since the start of this activity in 2017) in the 2 project locations (Stolipinovo and Kuklen).  

The health mediator Giulezar Sadak carries out the field work with the community in Stolipinovo together with the health expert Nina Bankova. They both organize health campaigns in different parts of Stolipinovo with the help of local healthcare professionals. Some of health campaign locations include local schools, kindergartens, the local employment service, etc. 6 health campaigns were organized in the adjacent town of Kuklen during the reporting period.

Number of general medical exams carried out by GPs/paediatricians and screenings – 1 349

Number of specialised medical examinations, incl. gynaecological examinations – 918

Number of health consultations (health mediators) – 4 196

Number of intrauterine devices - 40

Number of beneficiaries of information campaigns and events, women and health support groups  - 736

Note: Data covers the period 2016 – 2018.

On the eve of 1 of June 2017, the international children’s day parents and children from Plovdiv’s neighborhood of Stolipinovo visited together a puppet theatre show staged in the hall of Lilia kindergarten. For most of them this was the first visit to a theatrical performance.

In general, Roma people from the neighborhood of Stolipinovo live an isolated life and leave their area once in a while. Therefore, part of the activities implemented under the ZOV project in Plovdiv aim at overcoming this segregated way of life. Through visiting cultural events such as theatres, puppet show, opera and concerts, staged not only in the Roma neighborhood but also outside its borders, Roma parents and their children are expected to gradually overcome the constraints imposed by life in ethnically encapsulated environment.   

Within the framework of the ZOV programme, a celebration of the International Day of Roma People has been organized on the 8^th of April at the building of Nayden Gerov primary school. The students performed in front of their parents, teachers, people from the neighborhood and the media. For the locals the event has become a true celebration of their Roma identity.  

A total of 170 children and parents participated in the empowerment initiatives such as the puppet theatre show and the celebration of the International Roma Day organized under the project.

In March 2018, the 4^th SDC Regional Seminar on Roma Social Inclusion was organized in the town of Plovdiv, south Bulgaria. The seminar focused on the institutionalization approach applied in Bulgaria, which was assessed for its strengths and weaknesses regarding effectiveness, sustainability and transformation options.

The objectives of this seminar were:

• to identify strengths and weaknesses of supporting Roma inclusion through governmental institutions and derive operational and policy recommendations;
• to reflect on how SDC country offices /integrated Embassies are promoting social inclusion through their programmes and active policy dialogue
• to take stock of the experiences, based on 5 years of exchange on inclusion in SDC programmes.

The ZOV programme served as the case and base for learning and sharing experiences on institutionalization – i.e. working with central authorities and local governments. Field visits were organized in Plovdiv, Kuklen, Sliven and Sofia. The insights from the fieldwork were shared and analyzed through a role play following the method of a forum where the participants from Romania and countries of Western Balkans, as well as Roma experts shared their best practices and related to the field visits. The findings and lessons were shared with Swiss Ambassadors in the region.