engleski

Understanding missing children: how can educational institutions contribute?

In the European Union, a child is reported missing every 2 minutes. To support children and families at this crucial time, a hotline for missing children was set up in Europe available through the same number in 31 countries: 116 000 (Missing Children Europe, 2017). Missing and exploited children represent an important societal problem including parents, teachers, policymakers… A child can be missing for many reasons, and the problem of missing children is far more complex. According to Missing Children Europe there are five major types of missing child cases exist: abduction by a third person ; family abduction ; runaways (national /international) ; missing unaccompanied migrant minors ; injured/lost or otherwise missing child. Children taken by strangers or slight acquaintances represent only one-hundredth of 1 percent of all missing children. Far more common are children who have run away, have gotten lost or injured, have been taken by a family member (usually in a custody dispute) or simply aren’t where they’re expected to be because of a miscommunication. The majority of missing children are suffering from extreme and long-lasting conflict in their families. They run away or are pushed out because they are in fight with their parents and siblings, friends or because they are victims of abuse and neglect. They are taken or held by parents battling fruitlessly over custody rights. So our response to missing children has to be about much more than bringing them home. It should include parenting education and other support programs that help build strong families and prevent problems in the first place. It has to include resources — such as family therapy, mediation and child protection — that help to resolve conflicts. When it comes to the existing practice of protecting and safeguarding children exposed to risk factors in Croatia, data reveals the existence of certain problems such as the lack of experts working directly with children and families, human trafficking also reaches high in the previous period. The Republic of Croatia use to be only a transit country, but in recent years noticed the change in this trend and the Republic of Croatia is increasingly emerging as a country of origin and final destination of trafficking victims. In this poster we will present project „116 000 Hotline for Missing Children Croatia“, which main objective is to contribute to reducing the occurrence of the disappearance of children or minors in the Republic of Croatia and contribution to the more effective finding of a child in the event of disappearance. Specific objectives of this program are: 1) Prevent of disappearances and runaways from family homes and social welfare homes ; 2) Awareness raising and sensitizing the public about missing children problem, children trafficking and other situation in which children rights are abused or neglected ; 3) Establish and maintain cooperation between educational institutions, civil society organizations and relevant stakeholders in order to address missing children problem multidisciplinary.

missing children, project 116 000 Hotline for Missing Children Croatia, educational institutions

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