Support to parenthood in Bor, Kragujevac, Vranje, and Novi Pazar

the previous week, representatives of the Standing Conference of Towns and Municipalities organized meetings in the cities of Bor (January 19, 2021), Kragujevac (January 20, 2021), Vranje (January 21, 2021) and Novi Pazar (January 22, 2021) on the occasion of the implementation of project ”Support to LSG for dissemination of good policies and practices of support to parenthood”. During The project aims to develop and improve existing public policies and procedures of local self-governments in order to strengthen the support system for parents/guardians in the first years of a child's growth. This project is implemented as part of the program "Support to Incentive Parenthood through Play", which is jointly implemented by UNICEF, SCTM, Consortium of institutions and organizations consisting of the City Institute of Public Health Belgrade, Republic Institute for Social Protection, Association of Nurses of Preschool Institutions of Serbia, Harmony - Center for Support of Early Development and Family Relations, as well as the Institute of Psychology of the Faculty of Philosophy, University of Belgrade, with the financial support of the LEGO Foundation.

These four cities are among the first six local self-governments that will be worked with during the first phase of the project, and then the knowledge and experience gained in the first phase will be transferred to the other 27 local self-governments.

In addition to high representatives of local self-government, the meetings were also attended by representatives of preschool institutions, health centers and centers for social work. Local self-governments have expressed high motivation to develop and improve various forms of support for incentive parenthood in the first years of children's development. The participants in the meeting agreed that it is very important to provide support to parents, because the whole situation caused by the COVID-19 pandemic posed huge challenges for parents, where apartment is a classroom for children, and an office for parents and a gym, all in context of great fear and concern for the health of their loved ones, but also financial uncertainty. One of the topics was the discussion on the manner and approach to activities throughout the project. One of the backbones of the project is the improvement of inter-institutional and intersectoral cooperation, both horizontal - between the health, education, social protection sectors, but also linking work between cities and municipalities, and vertical, interlacing different levels of government - local and central. The idea is to map, interconnect, and improve the resources of the entire local community in order to empower parents, because only a stable and empowered parent can provide their children with a safe and happy upbringing in a healthy environment.