Albania Achievements and needs: building capacities of Child Protection Units

28 May 2009 |

Tirana, Albania: At the begining of May, Child Protection workers of 14 municipalities and communes and their supervisors gathered in Tirana in a training, organized by Terre des hommes in Albania, with the support of UNICEF in Albania. In a two-day training the participants had a chance to learn and discus about advocacy and lobbying, reporting skills, team-building, presentation and moderation of case management round-tables and conflict management. Inter-active training methods allowed the participants to reproduce in role-plays some of the work practices applied in case management mainly related to child protection case management conference.

The participants profited from this occasion to discuss on some similar concerns their share in their every day work. One of them is the need to mobilize relevant stakeholders outside the municipality such as policemen, health personnel among others, to be able to take action in child protection. The participants shared their needs for further the trainings. They considered especially relevant training on legal background regarding child protection legal remedies but also project proposal writing and financial management.

Child Protection Unit represent still a new reality in Albania, and the Child Protection Workers themselves and their managers have to go a long way in order to be fully functional in managing cases in need of protection. The local governments agree to develop new duties such as enhanced social services other than the traditional cash delivery one: a pro-active child protection through case management.

Child Protection Units have been established by municipalities and communes since 2005 in Albania and are mainly supported by non-governmental organizations in capacity building and financial assistance. Namely, Unicef is supporting financially 10 CPUs, through the technical assistance of Terre des hommes in Albania in 7 municipalities, Partner for Children is supporting two CPUs, VMA Kukes one, Save the Children in Albania one in Kucova, and finally World Vision is supporting three CPUs in the communes of Lezha district. [VL]