The start of the project "Remedial education and child protection through local community participation"

Khan Younis: the Palestinian Center for Democracy and Conflict Resolution, in partnership with Save the Children and with funding from Italian Cooperation, has begun carrying out the events of the project "Remedial education and child protection through local community participation", where the project is carried out in the areas of Al-Qarara and Khuzaa as border areas exposed to incursions. The project targets 960 pupils from the adolescent group aged 15 to 17, whose level of academic attainment has fallen because of the psychological circumstances they were exposed to after the last war on the Gaza Strip, which affected them negatively and was reflected in their educational level. Raed Saada, the project coordinator, noted that this project aims at improving the pupils' educational level through educational sessions in English, mathematics and Arabic, developing their energies, giving them a number of life skills, strengthening their self-confidence through psychological support activities, and strengthening their protection and the attention given to them by parents, teachers and members of the local community. The project also aims at improving the educational environment and advocating children's rights, through a set of activities carried out at four schools in Al-Qarara and Khuzaa, in a joint effort between a committee of pupils inside the school and the school counsellor. A counselling point has also been opened in each of Al-Qarara and Khuzaa to receive and follow up the cases of children suffering behavioural and psychological problems, staffed by a number of specialist psychological counsellors.