The World Vision Romania Foundation is launching the second edition of the „Start in Education” preschool program, this year with a double number of beneficiaries, write Agerpres.

Thus, 120,000 preschoolers will each receive a „Future-bound Backpack” containing educational development materials, and 23,000 parents will participate in the sessions of the „School of parents”. The total value of the program implemented jointly by the World Vision Romania Foundation and the OMV Petrom Foundation is over 7 million euros.

A novelty are the training programs for 3,500 educators and the distribution of „ABC Kindergarten” educational kits for 1,500 underprivileged kindergartens. The program will be implemented in 900 communities in 41 counties, World Vision Romania announced. The second edition also comes with new topics: nutrition and the healthy development of the child, preschool children’s characteristics by age range, the mental and emotional development of the little ones, parent – child communication of emotions.

Following the first year of the project’s implementation, eight in ten children improved their cognitive, creative and recognition skills, thanks to the educational kit „Future-bound Backpack”, and 94 percent of the parents consider that the parenting education sessions carried out as part of the project were very helpful to them.

Foundation executive director Mihaela Nabar told a press conference on Tuesday that following the offered counseling sessions, the parents declared that they are now better prepared to protect their children, and that the number of those who hit or abuse their children has dwindled. Nabar mentioned that although the number of preschoolers attending kindergarten has increased, 25 percent do so only three days a week or less.

„The most important reason is that they don’t have resources. If we look at the community, we see a lack of infrastructure, and then the local authorities seek help from us and support to improve this infrastructure. If we look at educators, 98 percent consider that preschool education is extremely important and something should be done in this regard, but they need help. So basically there are many goals that keep us moving forward, to do our best this year as well,” she said.

Some of the consequences of preschoolers missing daily kindergarten attendance are the inability to count to ten (17 percent of parents noticed this), to name the four seasons (27 percent) or to use at least four words in a sentence (10 percent).

Secretary of State with the Education Ministry Sorin Ion pointed out that the World Vision project is a broad-scale one, and also emphasized the importance of the parents’ involvement. He also mentioned that the ministry is currently working on the subsequent education legislation, as almost 300 secondary regulatory acts are needed just for pre-university education.

„In kindergarten, more than at any other level of education, parental participation in education can make the difference between knowing or not knowing how to count to ten, being able to name the four seasons and form four-word sentences. (…) A child’s success along their school path depends overwhelmingly on what happens in kindergarten,” he said.

Catalina Galer, state counselor with the Presidential Administration, remarked the exceptional results of the World Vision project and pointed out that education represents „the only chance for a better life”, both for children and for parents.

„We cannot ignore the fact that we are going through extremely difficult times, when we have the impression, rightly so, that our values are being questioned. Many families are facing financial difficulties that regrettably strike education off their list of investment-worthy objectives, also in a broader timeframe,” she said.

According to World Vision, the 1,500 kindergartens that will receive the „ABC Kindergarten” educational kits will be selected through a national call for applications that will be announced in the next period. The kit includes didactic materials for psychomotor and cognitive skills development, for the educators to organize games and kindergarten activities with.

The teachers’ training curriculum includes both parenting topics and applied methods of interactive and game-based learning. Educators will also receive a package of support materials for their didactic activity and for liaising with parents: parenting education guide, instructions and exercises for educators, new early education methods, examples of non-formal activities.