Paul Astakhov: Social work should become a part of our life

The ombudsman for children’s rights under the President of Russia Paul Astakhov called the problem of training specialists for the children’s institutions one of the most important.

“The institutes have to train the specialists, which are demanded by your Republic” – he mentioned, talking to the journalists in Ufa – “The country faces the urgent problem with training of the well-qualified specialists today, though the great number of our institutes train various specialists”.

Paul Astakhov mentioned the problem with the specialists in social sphere and in particular at the children’s institutions, where the average age of the managers is 55-60 years.

“Today we failed to prepare the generation of the specialists, which can come to the children’s institutions and start working with the children, using absolutely new approaches” – he underscored – “The matter is not money, we have just to explain to our youth that not the education determines the future profession and the appointment but the desire. The institutes have to hold the actions, aimed at attraction of youth to the children’s institutions”.

As Paul Astakhov explained, the scheme of such interaction is quite simple: the direct contract is signed between the institute and the children’s institution and curators or volunteers (no matter how they can be called) come to start working at these institutions. The essence is the communication between the pupils of these institutions and the young people, in the example one has to strive for. And for the volunteers this is the chance to open their hearts to the children, who really need this care.

“Social work should become a part of our life, this is not the lot of some special social services, this is our life” – Paul Astakhov stated.