“My visit in Balıkesir will stay deep in my heart!”
Tsvetelina Karanikolova
/Bulgarian Youth Forum/
My participation as an expert from Bulgarian Youth Forum in the international project “Crime, youth and social service”, was excellent opportunity for me to discuss in detail the issue of young criminals in international and multicultural level. The outstanding conditions for work during the training in Turkey have encouraged the representatives of different countries to demonstrate their professional skills and competences. That contributed for the excellent evaluation of the event both by the participants and local authorities in the host country.
As the name shows “Crime, youth and social service” the project was dedicated to delinquency and crime problems among the youth. The social services, local strategies and scientific approach for reducing the youth crime was widely covered in the project. The project was held in the city of Balıkesir between (04. 11 and 10. 11. 2012). During those six days we were able to learn some of the Turkish national traditions and the very interesting culture of Romania and Italy.
During the project the work with all participants was efficient and very useful for me. Divided into two main groups we discussed issues related to the root causes leading to “jump the border of the law” of juvenile offenders, especially the methods for coping with these problems. All of the participants shared the most successful practices applied in their countries through the exchange of experiences and ideas presented by young professionals from Europe and Turkey. We have established a new and hopefully successful model for dealing with juvenile delinquency.
Thanks to the organizers, we got a closer look into the current system of social services for juvenile offenders visiting the Center for children up to 12 years in the town of Ayvalık, and the center for social services for children from 14 to 18 years in the city of Balıkesir. These visits were beneficial, because the relationship with the children and the contacts with them (through games: table tennis, football, basketball, billiards, chess) gave us opportunity to get to know how runs their day, what is the role of the social worker in their lives and something very important: the success of the Turkish social system.
My visit in Balıkesir will stay deep in my heart because there I faced with numerous positive emotions, I saw a beautiful landscapes, I worked in a productive atmosphere with creative professionals, which, through their experience and ideas, made this project a huge success!
Sofia,
20.11.2012<