We work to fight early school leaving and help the children that want to continue their development path.
THE PROJECT
For the fourth year in a row, Fondazione Milan operates is in the territory of Bollate with the project Sport for Change, dedicated to teens and pre-teens at risk of early school leaving. The project includes tailor-made annual programs to help teens and pre-teens to discover their skills and talents, to raise their self-esteem, to develop significant relationships, helping them to resume their studies.
LA SITUAZIONE
The territory of Bollate is characterised by an increasing number of socially disadvantaged families. The association “Comuni Insieme” takes care of 263 minors alongside “Servizio minori prevenzione e tutela”, “Servizio affidi”, “Polo pedagogico” and “Servizio educativo minori domiciliare”. In 2016, 52 new minors have been taken on responsibility compared with the previous year.
Instead, with reference to parents, the main weakness is the lack of communication, ie the fact that they are not fit for the parental role nor they are able to follow their children’s changing needs.
Therefore, the aim of 59% of the interventions is to support the families in their duties towards their children. 8% of these parents have psychiatric disorders and the educational mentorship is strongly needed to prevent possible risks for the kids. Specifically, there is a high number of kids affected by emotional shortcomings (50%) and another high percentage of kids “with no” family and/or isolated (21%), that is, they experience a condition of carelessness whether material or emotional without the incentives necessary for their development. As a consequence, a large number of school-age minors are likely to remain excluded from stimulating aggregative contexts in terms of development.
HOW TO INTERVENE
The project lies in this scenario and the aim is to create a network of protected areas which can take care of pre-teens and help them through the delicate phase of growing up.
Children are involved in ongoing sporting activities, completed by creative labs. These educational moments are very important both for the parents and the kids of the sports centres, as well as for all the coaches of “Ardor”, with the aim of facilitating adults’ relationship with children and to raise awareness on the importance of sport as an opportunity of well-being, as an experience which carries values and as a means to develop relational skills.
The project is made up of different activities:
Sporting activity twice a week, managed by the coaches of Ardor Bollate. The coaches are supported by a tutor and a psychologist with the aim of improving relationships and who will intervene with individual and specific actions based on children’s needs. Training sessions will be provided to support the creation of an inclusive sports culture for Ardor Bollate’s coaches who manage teams with kids of the same age of those of the Sport for Change group. These training sessions are carried out through moments of sport shared with the teams of Sport for Change.
The psychological and educational path includes the support of a tutor and a psychologist during the training sessions and the education labs. For each individual, the season objectives are set on the basis of the weaknesses emerged during the individual interviews, while the aim of the group is cohesion, inclusion, flexibility, management of frustrations.
The project provides for work sessions with children, parents and organizers:
– monthly meetings with the schools;
– ad hoc interviews
– an initial, mid-term and final plenary session on how the project is working out for children’s parents
Other informal session are organised among the parents of the Sport for Change project and the parents of the children who play for Ardor, with the aim of helping the creation of positive relationships and to support them in their parental role.
The Multimedia Lab aims at involving the kids of Sport for Change in a different activity from the sporting one, to encourage and to empower them. The Lab is the opportunity to help the creation of relationships between these kids and their peers who are part of “Ardor” different sports classes, involving them in an activity that tells what Ardor Bollate is.
BENEFICIARIES
The beneficiaries of the project are 15 kids aged 11 to 14 identified by the schools and their families. All kids are at risk of social isolation and with relational difficulties. 4 kids of the group have already taken part in the project last season.
TERRITORIAL NETWORK
The project is carried out in collaboration with:
– Polisportiva Ardor Bollate.
The association, which has been working together with Fondazione Milan from the first year of the project, will make available structures and technical staff – tutors, coaches and psychologists – who will be closely following the children in their annual path and will be taking care of the training sessions for coaches and parents.
– Two schools, Istituto Comprensivo Antonio Rosmini and Scuola Secondaria Eugenio Montale, who send the kids at risk of early school leaving.
– The parish San Martino.
