News

The shared knowledge: Peer-to-peer education

Stara Zagora, December 17, 2018

Students, trained by BFPA in peer education, made a memorable presentation for their schoolmates and teachers on the topic of human trafficking. Alex Stefanova, Mitko Draganov, Yulia Sabandjieva and Rumen Balashov from the Romain Rolland Foreign Language High School in Stara Zagora demonstrated their good presentational skills in front of an audience of tenth-graders and impressed with their enthusiasm to share knowledge on socially significant topics, and namely - on topics concerning the health and well-being of young people. The young BFPA volunteers managed to lay out the types of potential threats that may cause involvement in trafficking for sexual exploitation and also to discuss how a person might fall in the trap through emotional attachment, which are the signs that an ad could be fake and may lead to labour exploitation; why people should be alert, and about the attention they should pay when communicating and sharing online.

Lessons for Students and Methodology for Working with Children, Parents and Teachers were Presented at the last for 2018 LAP Meeting

Sofia, December 5, 2018

The following ant the last for this year meeting of the Learning Action Partnership (LAP) took place on December 5, 2018 in the office of BFPA. Colleagues from Social Inclusion Directorate in MLSP, BFPA, ARC Foundation, Know-How Center for Alternative Care of Children in NBU, Reflective Learning Bulgaria Association, GERT Foundation, NCFTP, Association Animus Foundation were present.
After a short presentation of everyone in the meeting the ideas for lessons for students in the age group 10-14 on trafficking prevention, developed by Know-How Center for Alternative Care on Svetulka project of SOS Children Villages were shared, as well as methodology for working with children, parents and teachers on topics connected with the social competences and prevention of violence, developed by a team – FICE Bulgaria (INTERNATIONAL FEDERATION OF EDUCATIVE COMMUNITIES), GERT Foundation and Therapeutic Communities , Bulgaria.

BFPA’s activities on World’s AIDS Day

Sofia, November 23 – December 3 2018

Between November 23rd and 30th for a sixth consecutive year took place the European testing week, in which BFPA has participated from the very first year. The aim of the campaign is as much people as possible to be encouraged to know their HIV, Hepatitis B and Hepatitis C status and respectively either start therapy and/or to be informed about the risks of infection and how to avoid them. This year besides HIV and Hepatitis B and C, BFPA also implemented testing for syphilis as well as dissemination of free condoms, donated to the association by Durex Bulgaria. At BFPA’s medical center were performed a total of 75 tests - 29 for HIV, 15 for Hepatitis B, 15 for Hepatitis C and 16 for syphilis. 749 national and multinational organizations from all over Europe participated in the testing week this year, 16 of which from Bulgaria.
On December 1st, the global day for battling HIV/AIDS, BFPA traditionally implements and supports different AIDS-prevention related activities and campaigns. Since the day itself falls on a weekend, some activities and campaigns were held during the weekend, some - on November 30th and on December 3rd.

Voice it 2018 – Let’s listen to the voice of children

Sofia, November 20, 2018

On November 20th, 29 years ago, the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child was accepted – a fundamental internationally recognized document which helps to create and develop adequate modern policies for improving the children’s well-being. To honour its ratification every year the members of the National Network for Children (NNC) organize public events to support child participation and help for the opinion of the young people to be heard. The name of the event announces it – it’s called Voice It. This year the topic of the event was chosen by the adolescents themselves and it concerns health and sexuality education. Location: the Largo in the heart of Sofia. Here are part of the musts and discussion topics: The need for health and sexuality education to be part of the school curriculum. When and where should the subject be presented, who should present it and not least – Why it is important for young people to have knowledge on all topics related to reproductive health? The topic was chosen by young people from Megaphone that were part of the panel and answered questions in connection with the forum topic, including prevention of trafficking, prevention of internet bullying, youth volunteering.

Premiere of BFPA’s short video on puberty at a peer ToT training

Plovdiv, October 29-30, 2018

Lidl Logo Break One of the main modules of the two-day training of young peer educators in Plovdiv was on puberty and growing up, during which for the first time was presented BFPA’s short film on puberty, made as a part of the project “The Challenges of Growing Up”, funded in the frame of Lidl WCIF Logo Bulgaria’s “You and Lidl for a Better Life” initiative. After watching it, the young participants in the training who were from three Plovdiv and three Sofia schools, plus the young volunteers of Red Cross Youth in Plovdiv, Haskovo and Pazardjik shared their impressions and recommendations, as part of an open discussion and filling a prepared in advance questionnaire. Among the main recommendation was the film to also be shown to parents and to start showing with younger children around 5th grade. They see the video as a good starting point for an educational discussion and thus will be good for a start. The rest of the training modules included contraception, hygiene, STI and HIV prevention, family planning, communicational skills and team-building, and there were a lot of questions, comments and discussions. The BYRC volunteers who attended the training supported with up-to-date statistical data about hygiene, HIV statistics in Bulgaria, health messages and campaigns.