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Tens of thousands of children left in Romania while their parents work abroad… on the Government’s ”waiting list”
According to the Romanian National Authority for Children’s Protection and Adoption, in 2019, in Romania we had more than 91.000 children who were left in the country with their parents working abroad. Clearly, these children have multiple vulnerabilities caused by their separation from their parents – starting with their (non)attendance to classes up to getting the medical care they need and the emotional nurturing and protection while growing up.
Published
3 years agoon
More than one year and a half since I launched in public consultation the guidelines for the EU-funded aid scheme dedicated to Romanian children left in the country while their parents work abroad, the Ministry of Investment and European Projects announced that they have selected only 37 projects from the entire country to be financed with EU funds. These projects, amounting to a total of €31 million non-refundable aid, seem a mere formal, insufficient intervention. And an inefficient one. Another 120, perfectly solid, verified projects, aiming tens of thousands of children are ignored… or, rather, placed on a waiting list.
The budget for this intervention has to be increased if it is produce a significant improvement in the lives of these children. Can we, finally, remove education from the eternal, shameful waiting list and can we, finally, place students and teachers at the center of Governmental plans and spending?
So, why do we finance so few of these projects? Why does the Romanian Government limit its intervention with EU structural funds, when it has another 120 mature projects, already evaluated by experts and with very high rankings just waiting to be implemented? Each project put on an a waiting list actually means an important chance to education and a decent life for a couple of hundreds of children. In total, we are talking the fate of about tens of thousands of children and teenagers.
We cannot put these kids on hold.
Yes, we know that at this moment we cannot help them all and, in fact, we don’t even know if in 2021 there are still only 91,000 children with parents living in the countries where they went to work. Also, we know that statistics aren’t accurate. But in deciding how to spend EU money, we, as a country, must aim do as much as we can for these especially vulnerable youngsters, instead of mimicking the funding of a public intervention.
Things are simple: the need is clear and profound, we almost 160 projects ready, we have allocations from EU funds already negotiated for education. Therefore, it cannot be that hard to manifest political will finance these projects.
After all, this is money going to education, the source of all our country’s problems, as we all say it, every chance we get.
As minister of EU funds, I coordinated the team that launched, in August 2019, the first guidelines of this innovative budget line meant to give access to education and social support to a very special category of children. It is true that the initial version of the guidelines had a budget of only €10 million, but, mind you, we were talking about a pilot program, dedicated to children from a single region of Romania, the poorest region, severely affected by mass immigration, The North-East region. Our intention, then, was to first test a model of integrated support for the education and social integration of Romanian children left in the country in the care of their relatives while the parents work in other EU countries
Now, if in 2020, the liberal government decided to launch the program for the entire country, that could have been a good thing. However, expanding the eligible territories for this aid scheme should have been accompanied by the augmentation of the available budget. That was not the case. Because, from one region the program expanded to seven regions, that is seven times. And, from €10 million, the budget expanded to €30 million, that is three times. You do the Math. We can all can see that it wasn’t a fair budgeting. The money just wasn’t enough.
The problem is that years go by between the moment a project proposal is written and the day that project starts to be implemented. In the case of these services that support children whose parents work outside Romania, we’re talking probably about two years. These are years that are lost from the lives of these children we try to help. The problems and deprivations they suffer in these years leave sometimes irreversible scars in their lives, turning them, in the end, into new statistics of early school leaving, poverty, illness or migration.
I think we must correct the errors we make before it’s too late.
After 2020 turned out to be a catastrophic year for Romanian education, marked by the failure of government to ensure access to online school for hundreds of thousands of disadvantaged children, after a year in which education was yet another Cinderella abandoned at the periphery of the Government agenda and in the ghetto of public financing, today we have an impending and acute need to decide firmly IN FAVOUR of education. The topic of this particular aid scheme could be just the first gesture. The first step.
All those in favour, say YES, we can. And we will.
Roxana Minzatu
Former minister of European funds, former member of the Chamber of deputies
Initiator of law 109/ 2020 concerning the endowment of students and teachers with digital devices connected to the Internet necessary to participate in online schooling.
A few details about the EU-funded aid scheme ”Pilot program to stimulate participation in education for children whose parents work abroad” (Human Capital Operational Program)
Eligible activities:
- integrated service measures for schoolchildren, including educational support services and psycho-social support services
- activities to stimulate participation in education and in children’s counseling, including recreational and socializing activities; children will be offered material support such as food, school supplies and educational resources.
- parental education services and social counseling for the representatives of the children, that is either for the parent from Romania in whose care the child is, should there be just one parent working abroad, or for the persons who hold in their care the child/children while the only parent or both parents are working abroad
Eligible applicants:
- public schools, private schools, providers of school counseling and school orientation services, social partners from the secondary educational level, religious institutions and associations, Government institutions in charge with social inclusion, NGOs
Timeline:
- The guidelines of the aid scheme was first published for consultation in August 2019
- Project proposals were submitted between February 25th 2020 and May 25th 2020.
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Tens of thousands of children left in Romania while their parents work abroad… on the Government’s ”waiting list”
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Tens of thousands of children left in Romania while their parents work abroad… on the Government’s ”waiting list”
Social enterprises can lever an inclusive digital transformation, that leaves no one behind
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