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If I ran SOS Children’s Village

August 14, 2007

SOS children speak up on how they’d run SOS Children’s Villages

SOS Children’s Villages excels in various forms of caring for abandoned and orphaned children, however what makes the non profit even more successful is the amount of time that is geared towards listening to its children. With such attention geared to the children, they “often ask what would happen if things were left up to the children to make the decisions? What would they consider priorities? What are their wishes?” SOS Children’s Villages indeed did ask those questions, to 600 of its inhabitant children whom range in age from 8-18 and responded from 26 different countries. SOS Children’s Villages plans to include the children’s suggestions in its study of future plans of improving the child caring organization.

“If I were a magician, I would build two new SOS Children’s Villages in two days. Hermann Gmeiner never managed to do that”, wrote back a child. Children at SOS are taught to appreciate and be thankful for what is provided to them. They are further more reminded that there are children whom remain less fortunate then they are. A common belief amongst SOS children is that SOS Children’s Villages should help even more for orphaned and abandoned children, through “building more houses, carrying out more preventive work and supporting more families financially”. They also pray that people can live in a world full of harmony, and unity for all.

“Most of all, I’d like to stay with my mother, brothers and sisters” another child wrote back. The sense of family is strong in SOS Children’s Villages. The children’s lives are centered on their family, which in the larger picture is the center of life in their villages. Even though SOS children’s village provides a superb family figure and structure, many children seek to contact and remain in contact with their biological families. With the preaching of families remaining strong in SOS communities, many teens write back about how frightened they are to leave their SOS Children’s Villages, and their desire to remain in contact with their SOS families.

Others wrote back, explaining that the abandoned and orphaned children living SOS Children’s Villages understand the importance and effect education has on their futures. As they seek to become more independent, they alert SOS children’s Villages about the stress that accompanies over exhaustion of achieving.

With all these concerns raised, the biggest that seems to be commonly shared by SOS children throughout various SOS Children’s Villages is the need for adults to respect their opinion. They like their brothers and sisters, ask to be taken seriously in the decision making. One of the children wrote back saying, “If I were the boss of SOS Children’s Villages, I would show children the right path to take in life, but I wouldn’t treat them as if I were a director. I would treat them as equals.” Comments such as “We should open the doors to everyone” or requests for more public sports and music events show that the young inhabitants of SOS Children’s Villages want to be more integrated into the surrounding communities. Children from SOS Children’s Villages should be treated the same as other children and should not be excluded from their surrounding communities.

Topics: Childrens Village news |