Roman Golovchenko and Alexander Subbotin congratulated the pupils of the Vitebsk Children's Home on the New Year
As part of the New Year's charity event "Our Children," the pupils of the Vitebsk Children's Home were congratulated by the Chairman of the Board of the National Bank of the Republic of Belarus, Roman Golovchenko, the Chairman of the Regional Executive Committee, Alexander Subbotin, and the Chairman of the Vitebsk City Executive Committee, Alexey Geroev.
Next year, this children's home will celebrate its 80th anniversary. It was opened in the post-war year of 1946 as a shelter for boys and girls who had lost their parents during the war. Today, as the director Kristina Ivanova said, 90 children aged 3 to 18 live and are raised here.
"Last year, 10 children entered colleges. One girl passed the history of Belarus exam with a grade of 10. The second, with a grade of 9.6, entered the Orsha College," explained Kristina Ivanova.
According to the educators, all children, both young and older, look forward to the New Year holidays, write letters to Santa Claus, and make wishes. And thanks to kind people, these wishes come true. For example, eleven-year-old Vlad received a coveted remote-controlled car as a gift, and 14-year-old Olya received a suitcase and a kettle, which will be useful when she goes to study to become a train conductor in the summer.
And ten-year-old Nastya wished to return to her biological family. And she wished all parents that their children would always be by their side.
"One boy, after receiving the gift he wrote about in his letter, shouted for everyone to hear: 'I never believed in Santa Claus, but he really exists! It was worth holding charity events for such emotions'," shared the director of the children's home.
This time, Santa Claus's helpers were the guests. They handed out sweet gifts to the boys and girls, and also presented certificates for the purchase of necessary items for the children's home.
– "Our Children" is a kind, heartfelt initiative. It has been traveling across Belarus for many years. The most important thing, perhaps, is that we try to somehow compensate or give children what they did not receive for various reasons in their biological families. Therefore, in these pre-holiday days, there are many guests with gifts in orphanages, foster families, and family-type homes. We all want a child who ends up in such institutions not to feel deprived or left without attention. I am not participating in such an initiative for the first time and I am always interested in the fate of the wards. There are many vivid examples when children from specialized institutions grow up to be full-fledged citizens of our country, achieve great success in their studies and work. But we must strive for every child to be in a family. A whole set of measures carried out by the state is aimed at this, – emphasized Roman Golovchenko.