SUMMARY: The National Association of Childcare Workers (NACCW) provides accredited child and youth care training to community members in order to provide holistic services to Orphans and Vulnerable Children (OVC) and their families. Funding will be used primarily in the emphasis area of training as well as for community mobilization, developing referrals and linkages, and conducting needs assessments. Primary target populations are OVC, HIV-infected families and their caregivers, and community organizations.

BACKGROUND: NACCW is the only South African non-government organization focusing on the provision of specialized and professional training in child and youth care. Over the past five years NACCW has developed the Isibindi Model, a community-based program that trains unemployed community members in an accredited child and youth care course and provides an integrated child and youth care service to child headed households and vulnerable families through partnerships between NACCW and community-based organizations. The plus up funding will be used to expand the program to provide basic palliative care to sick OVC and their family members.

ACTIVITY 1: Clinical Services for OVC and their families CYCW will provide information on clinical services and refer OVC and their families for diagnosis, screening and accessing treatment services such as TB or ARV treatment. CYCW will regularly follow up to ensure that services are accessed and to provide adherence support for adults and children on treatment. CYCW will be capacitated to identify children requiring clinical services or hospitalization and to provide referrals to children and family members. NACCW will ensure each Isibindi site is linked to a network of clinical care services and providers.

ACTIVITY 2: Psychological/Social Services for OVC and their families CYCW will assist OVC and their families with a range of social and psychological services. This will include providing information on and assisting caregivers to access disability grants and other forms of economic support. CYCW will also provide family counseling and assist with succession planning. This will include ensuring caregivers have wills, making arrangements for the care of children, ensuring children have birth certificates and identity documents and providing support for disclosure. CYCW will provide bereavement support and counseling and refer family members to social workers and other support services. CYCW also ensure that families live in hygienic and safe home environments and assist family members to maintain their households.

ACTIVITY 3: Training of CYCW CYCW in 23 Isibindi projects will be trained by Bigshoes on a 5-day program focusing on providing palliative care services to OVC and their families or caregivers with the aim of delaying orphanhood. This will include providing referrals to clinical services and providing social and psychological services designed to support family caregivers and sick OVC. Regular mentorship will ensure that CYCW are able to implement the services and provide quality care and support to OVC and their families.

ACTIVITY 4: Care for Caregivers NACCW will contract the services of registered therapists to provide support to CYCW in all 23 Isibindi sites. The purpose of this intervention is to deepen the CYCW relationship with themselves, thereby facilitating deeper and more sustainable relationships with their clients. The less they are burdened by their personal feelings and stories, the more emotionally available they will be for their clients. They should also begin to develop a healthy discrimination for appropriate levels of involvement with their clients. The support will include debriefing sessions, workshops and individual counseling in a structured six month program. It is anticipated that this intervention will reduce burn out, psychosomatic symptoms among CYCW, increase the quality of services provided and improve the long-term sustainability of the program.

SUMMARY: The National Association of Childcare Workers (NACCW) provides accredited child and youth care training to community members in order to provide holistic services to OVC. Funding will be used in the emphasis area of training and community mobilization, developing referrals and linkages, and conducting needs assessments. Primary target populations are OVC, HIV-infected families and their caregivers, and community organizations.

BACKGROUND: NACCW is the only South African NGO focusing on provision of specialized, professional training in child and youth care. NACCW has developed a unique community-based child and youth care response to the HIV and AIDS crisis called the Isibindi Model. This program trains unemployed community members in an accredited child and youth care course and provides an integrated child and youth care service to child headed households and vulnerable families through partnerships between NACCW and community-based organizations. This project is part of a larger initiative of the NACCW to replicate the Isibindi Model nationally in partnership with the Department of Social Development (DoSD). Since 2004, PEPFAR has supported 14 of NACCW's 40 Isibindi projects, providing direct services to 3755 OVC and training for 209 child and youth care workers in 6 provinces in South Africa. The NACCW also offers this accredited training to other PEPFAR funded projects.

To promote the sustainability of the NACCW Isibindi childcare model, public-private partnerships will support the program in selected provinces. Partners include De Beers Fund, Anglo America Chairman's Fund, AngloGold, Royal Netherlands Embassy, UNICEF and the Impumelelo Innovations Award Trust.

ACTIVITIES AND EXPECTED RESULTS: ACTIVITY 1: Training and Mentorship. Accredited child and youth care training at South Africa's National Qualification Framework (NQF) level will be provided to child and youth care workers and selected volunteers in all sites. This training is the only accredited basic child and youth care course in the country in the profession of Child Care Work. This accredited training will allow workers to be registered as Auxiliary Child and Youth Care Workers with the South African Professional Board for Child and Youth Care Work. This registration promotes professional practice and ensures that workers function within a professional code of ethics. In FY 2007 expert consultants and mentors will be provided to all 17 Isibindi Projects to ensure development of the project staff and thus ensure provision of quality services.

ACTIVITY 2: OVC Outreach services. NACCW will ensure that all OVC are visited regularly and provided with services within a child rights framework. These services will include education on children's rights and assistance with access to education, facilitating access to legal documents, food parcels, social security grants, ARV treatment for children and health care, child protection, services for recreation and play, educational support and bereavement and grief work. Health Care services will include general health care, health care for HIV-infected OVC and preventive health care services. NACCW will ensure that OVC also receive child care services including counseling, grief-work, age-appropriate developmental programs and assessment in the context of ordinary daily events like bath-times, mealtimes, study times and playtimes. Lifespace work (using daily events and routines like meal preparation, meal times, study times, play times etc) will be offered in the community in homes, schools and drop-in centers to build resilience and empower OVC to take charge of their lives. To respond to large numbers of children requiring after school care services and less intensive support, the NACCW Isibindi projects will create safe parks - safe places where children can play with access to child and youth care workers. The safe park will provide homework supervision, health care assessments and discussions, organized sports fixtures, free play, group discussions, cultural activities and the opportunity for children to connect with adults in a safe environment.

ACTIVITY 3: Child Protection and Gender Equity. The NACCW program will focus on the identification, care, management and referral of children who are abused and neglected. This will be a focus area of the NACCW project in FY 2007. Expert training and support from other specialist organizations will ensure effective service from the child and youth care workers according to minimum standards and practice procedure. Care givers will be sensitized and trained to actively identify and address gender-based violence in vulnerable households, particularly households headed by young females. Children with disabilities

will benefit from focused developmental and support programs by trained child care workers including referrals and physical therapy. In addition, a gender program for the protection and promotion of the girl child will be developed in the 17 PEPFAR supported NACCW sites. This gender program will include women's development/leadership skills workshops for the child and youth workers so that gender sensitivity, women's rights and protection will be integrated into the ethos of daily activities and programs of the Isibindi project. A specific girl child program will be in place in all Isibindi sites including career camps and bursaries for girl children who have passed their final exams (grade 12) and are heading households, increasing economic security for the girl child and siblings in the home.

ACTIVITY 4: Advocacy. The Isibindi Model translates SAG policy for OVC into practice. By sharing better practices from the Isibindi model with national and provincial government departments, NACCW will help inform national policy on OVC. NACCW promotes the UN Children's Rights Charter, the South African National OVC policy and the South African Draft Children's Bill as well as other national policy and legislation for the protection and promotion of children rights and interests in the context of HIV and AIDS. In FY 2007 NACCW will continue to target key stakeholders such as magistrates, social workers, and officials in SAG departments such as Home Affairs (responsible for birth certificates) and Education, at provincial local level through meetings and other forums to ensure that government policy and legislation are implemented in the best interests of the child. In all Isibindi projects, children who have been refused admission to school (for lack of school uniforms or nonpayment of school fees) have all been successfully readmitted.

Plus-up finding will be used for: a) Care and support for disabled orphans and vulnerable children. NACCW will conduct a needs assessment of each Isibindi site to identify OVC requiring care and support. CYCW will network with health care facilities and service providers in each site to foster access to specialised and disability services. A report for each site will document the number of children with special needs, describe the identified needs (both in individual children and as a group), outline existing local health/social service facilities, and articulate an action plan. NACCW mentors will meet with appropriate rehabilitation departments at local hospitals or clinics. CYCW will refer OVC for services and follow up to ensure services are received. b) Gender program for adolescent OVC. In addition to NACCW's child protection and gender equity activities, NACCW will also implement interventions designed to meet the needs of adolescent OVC girls and boys. CYCW will be trained on the needs of adolescent girls and boys and activities will be mainstreamed into all household visits and at Safe Parks. Activities will include information and education on reproductive health and teenage pregnancy, gender based violence and gender roles.