Teen Lab Daily Education Centre

The CAF Association was founded in 1979 as an innovative place where children and young people removed from their families as victims of abuse and serious mistreatment are specifically and professionally welcomed and cared for, trying to break the chain that still too often turns these minors into violent or neglectful adults.

From its foundation until now, the CAF Association has welcomed and taken care of over a thousand minors and offered important support to their families in crisis. In response to local needs, the Association has also developed a specific service to promote and support family fostering as a form of care for children and young people who cannot return to their families.

The Teen Lab Daily Education Centre is a semi-residential service aimed at local adolescents from failed foster care/adoption or from fragile family contexts, characterised by violent behaviour or serious educational inadequacies.

Teen Lab is characterised by the integration of young people sent by the Social Services, and thus registered at a day centre on the basis of a decree of the Juvenile Court, and young people with “direct referral” referred by the school or the family itself, by word of mouth. Due to the pandemic, this important reception service was suspended for two years, after which it faced a situation of greater distress than in the past.

If, in fact, the minors in the Association's care already have a traumatic history behind them that prevents them from growing up in a healthy and balanced manner, following the restrictions and remote lessons imposed by the health emergency, their frailties have greatly increased.

In response to this changed scenario, the Teen Lab Educational Daily Centre reopened its doors to the area's adolescents with even greater attention to the specific needs of each one, resuming all the activities in place before its suspension and adding new services that could meet the new needs that have inevitably emerged in recent years.

Thanks to our support, the centre once again welcomes boys and girls between 12 and 18 years old to support them in their growth and orientation towards the future. The space, open every afternoon from Monday to Friday, from 1.30 p.m. to 6.30 p.m., can accommodate 15 young people a day, for each of whom a multidisciplinary team, made up of professional educators and psychologists who are experts in developmental issues, develops a customised psycho-educational project aimed at strengthening their resources and potential. Teen Lab dedicates a lot of space to studying, not as a simple "after-school" for doing homework, but rather with the aim of providing children with concrete tools to build their own learning method.

In addition to the numerous educational and experiential activities organised during the week, another very important aspect of the intervention is the involvement of the families of the children accommodated, to make them more involved and aware of the path their children are taking at the centre and thus favour their continuation in the family environment.

Finally, special attention is paid to the care of places, which play an important role in the hospitality project. Our support has therefore also contributed to the redevelopment of some of the Teen Lab spaces: in particular, the large outdoor terrace has been made safe and completely refurbished, and can be used from April to October as a study space, to hold workshops, to host birthday parties or special get-togethers, or simply as a space for relaxation and recreation for the young people who attend the centre.

Details:

City: Milan

Association: CAF Association

Intended beneficiaries: minors and teenagers

Contribution: up to €70.000

Period: January 2023 - December 2023