The project Yeniden will be implemented by Anadolu Kültür as the executive partner in collaboration with Deprem Dayanışma (Earthquake Solidarity) Association in Hatay, Maya Association in Mersin, and Kırkayak Kültür in Gaziantep.

The project was developed with a participatory, localized and sustainability approach by maintaining close communication and solidarity with local organizations that Anadolu Kültür has been working with for a long time in the immediate aftermath of the February Earthquakes, working together in the field and conducting pilot studies in the months following the earthquake.

The project, together with its local partners, will establish communities of practitioners in each city, and aims to strengthen their knowledge and skills in “rights-based approach”, “child safety” and “psychosocial support through arts” so that children and young people have regular access to arts-based activities and build the capacities of local institutions in these areas.

While there are still many obstacles to access to rights in different areas for both adults and children in the earthquake regions, Yeniden Project prioritizes community-based empowerment that supports rights-based practices by increasing the capacities and capabilities of local organizations and individuals, and aims to move forward in a holistic framework in three cities, at three levels, in three different areas.

PROJECT OFFERS THREE LAYERS SUPPORT SYSTEM

1- Organizational Capacity Building: The project will support the capacity building of our local project partners in all three cities in rights-based and arts-oriented children and youth work. We will be creating and monitoring child safeguarding policy documents and codes of conduct together and we will be strengthening them in terms of active human resources by establishing and sustaining local communities of practitioners.

2- Local Community Building and Empowerment: Our local project partners will create a “community of practice” of adults who live in their city and have been directly affected by the earthquake, they will empower themselves and each other in the community with the trainings and contribution by the experts and artists, they will have the opportunity to practice in small groups and receive supervision.

3- Supporting Children and Youth through Arts: Local partners and the community members will be conducting rights-based and art-oriented, regular, monitorable activities with children and youth with different needs and from different age groups. Thus, children and youth will have better opportunities of self-expression through creative methods and access to regular activities for “learning through arts”.

PROJECT HOLDS a HOLISTIC FRAMEWORK in THREE AREAS

We are aware that the project involves working in cities which have been severely affected by the earthquake in various ways and with individuals and communities who have directly experienced and are still going through the devastating impact of the earthquakes in its many dimensions. Therefore, we have established a comprehensive support system. First, we support our three local partners through the employment of a local coordinator throughout the project and providing a mentor for organizational capacity building.

Regarding the project participants who will constitute the local communities of practice, there is a triangle support framework. In addition to trainings and workshops that aim to strengthen the knowledge and skills of local organizations and project participants, we also provide partial financial support to each project participant and a comprehensive staff care and well-being program for both the local organizations’ team and project participants.

In this context, each project participant will be paid for each child/youth activity they will run during the four-month period in which they will be active participants, and will be offered the opportunity to request psychological support through individual sessions and group work, expressive art workshops and creative expression free of charge.

PROJECT SCHEDULE AND CYCLES

The one-year project is organized in two periods in each of the three cities.

In each cycle, a “community of practitioners” will be formed by identifying 25 adults who are eager to achieve self-empowerment and to work on the project topics. Applications to become project participants will be submitted through application forms.

The project aims to support at least 50 people in a city, 150 in total covering the three involved cities in one year.

Participants of each cycle will be supported with various trainings, workshops and community activities over a four-month period, and will be able to practice with children and young people and receive supervision from experts.

Project First Cycle: March 15 - July 15 (4 Months)
Project Second Cycle: August 15 - December 15 (4 Months)

The project offers a four-month program from March 15th to July 15th for the participants of the first phase and foresees the active participation of the project participants.

THE PROJECT OFFERS A FOUR-MONTH PROGRAM TO ITS PARTICIPANTS IN EACH PERIOD

The program is designed in an in-depth, holistic and comprehensive structure that will contribute to the participants' current and future professional lives in the fields of working with children and youth and arts education.

As the first step of the four-month program, project participants are invited to a four full-day Ground Training in their home cities.

For the participants who complete this training in full, spread over three months periods, “Psychosocial Support Through Arts - Implementer Trainings” in different art branches will be offered again in their home cities. Participants are expected to fully participate in at least one of these five-day trainings, including two days of practitioner trainings and three days of pilot implementations.

Each “Psychosocial Support through Arts - Implementer Training” is followed by a four to five-week implementation phase. “Activities with Children and Youth through Arts” are to be carried out with children and youth from different needs and age groups in different parts of the city, in physical locations identified and organized by the local project partner organization. During these active implementation periods, participants have the opportunity to receive online supervision and mentoring from experts.

Project participants are also offered the opportunity to receive a certificate if they fully participate in training and workshops and carry out the necessary number of activities with children and youth.

Yeniden Project will carry out all activities in Mersin, Hatay and Gaziantep in parallel, working with impact-evaluation experts at the institutional level, at the adult and community of practice level, and at the child and youth level. We will share a comparative monitoring report focusing on the first and second phases of the project, and a short evaluation and recommendations note as the project’s final output.

The Yeniden Project is realized with the support of the Fondation de France and Stiftung Mercator.