Purpose and Activity of the Facility
- Ensuring the basic right of the child to education within international conventions on human rights.
- Treatment of the child for the full development of his/her character.
- The purpose of the facilities is to provide a child (of 3–18/19 years of age) on the basis of a court order with supplemental institutional treatment in the interest of his/her healthy development, proper education and instruction.
- The purpose of preventive educational facilities, which are components of the system, is to avoid the origin and development of negative manifestations in the behaviour of a child or disruption of his/her healthy development, and to limit or eliminate the consequences of already established behavioural disorders.
- The facilities provide the care otherwise provided by parents or other persons into whose care the child has been entrusted.
- They also provide care to children who are not citizens of the CR – ‘the children-foreigners without accompaniment’.
- They can provide care also to persons without support or means between 18 (19) and 26 years of age provided that they are preparing for a future career.
- They provide an opportunity for religious education with respect to the family tradition and cognitive abilities of the child.
- For children with severe behavioural disorders, elementary and secondary schools with corresponding educational programmes are established in the educational facilities.
- For reports, the schools use forms and stamps with the name and address of the school without the name of the
educational facility in an attempt to avoid stigmatising the child.
Care According to the Level of Disruption
Specific educational needs in graded extent for children:
- independent commensurate to the age
- independent, requiring occasional supervision
- requiring occasional guidance and constant supervision
- not independent, requiring constant supervision
- requiring systemic intensive individual care
Types of Facilities
- Diagnostic Institute (Children’s Diagnostic Institute /CDI/, Diagnostic Institute for Youth /DIY/)
14 facilities – a capacity of 530 – an average of 38 children per DI - Children’s Home (CH)
150 facilities – a capacity of 5,310 – an average of 35 children per CH - Children’s Home and School (CHS)
29 facilities – a capacity of 1,030 – an average of 35 children per CHS - Institutional Treatment Institute (ITI)
34 facilities – a capacity of 1,426 – an average of 42 children per ITI - A T O T A L of 227 facilities with a capacity of 8,296 children
Organisational Structure
- Children’s Diagnostic Institute (3–15 years of age)
- Children’s Home (3–18 years of age)
- Children’s Home and School (12–15 years of age)
- Institutional Treatment Institute for Youth (12–18 years of age)
- Diagnostic Institute for Youth (15–18/19 years of age)
- Children’s Home
- Children’s Home and School
- Institutional Treatment Institute for Youth
Organisation of the Facilities
- In a children’s home and children’s home and school, the organisational units are family groups:
- children’s home: 6–8 children
- children’s home and school: 5–8 children
- In a diagnostic and institutional treatment institute, the organisational units are educational groups:
- diagnostic institute: 4–8 children
- institutional treatment institute: 5–8 children
- In a facility (in one building or complex), a minimum of two and a maximum of six educational groups can be organised.
Diagnostic Institute
- accepts a child from the field, subsequently places and transfers him/her according to the space available into a children’s home, children’s home and school, and institutional treatment institute (with an attempt to accommodate the wishes of the child)
- Diagnostic Tasks
- Psychological
- Special Educational
- Social
- School – Educational
- Instructional Tasks
- Therapeutic Tasks
- Educational and Social Tasks
Subsequent Facilities
- Children’s Home – for children without serious behavioural disorders
- Children’s Home and School – for children up to 15 years of age with serious behavioural disorders, children with court-ordered juvenile correctional education
- Institutional Treatment Institute – for children over 15 years of age with serious behavioural disorders or
juvenile correctional education
Children’s Home
- primarily instructional, educational and social tasks
- care for children without serious behavioural disorders
- education at schools which are not its component
- children of usually 3–18 (up to 26) years of age
- possibility of placement of also underage mothers with children
Children’s Home and School
- care for children with institutional care or juvenile correctional education with more significant behavioural disorders usually in the age of elementary school attendance
- separate institutes or groups for the provision of institutional care and juvenile correctional education
- possibility of placement of underage mothers with children
- education normally at a school which is part of the home
- children in the age from 6 to the completion of compulsory school attendance
- If educational problems continue, the child is usually transferred to an institutional treatment institute.
Institutional Treatment Institute
- care for children over 15 years of age with severe behavioural disorders with court-ordered institutional care or juvenile correctional education
- possibility of care also for children older than 12 with education in a juvenile correction institution, exceptionally even children with institutional treatment (particularly severe behavioural disorders)
- separate institutes or groups for the provision of institutional and juvenile correctional education
- An elementary or secondary school is established at the institutional treatment institute.
Children with Extreme Behavioural Disorders
- The children are placed in institutional treatment institutes established for this purpose, or in educational
groups at normal institutional treatment institutes when:
- they repeatedly leave the facility without permission, during which they commit a crime
- they are aggressive with signs of a mental disorder
- they are aggressive with signs of drug addiction
- they are habitual offenders
The dominant parts of the programme are corresponding psychotherapeutic and sociotherapeutic techniques of both an
individual and group character.
When working with a group, three members of the pedagogical staff are present, one of whom is a teacher assistant.
