The Paros Foundation launched the Debi Arach Children’s Center in Gyumri, Armenia on April 15, 2015 with the help of generous donors. The center, which provides 185 children each week the necessary academic, psychological, social and humanitarian support, has since been a source of positivity in this city. The residents of Gyumri, Armenia’s second largest city have endured very devastating realities since the tragic 1988 Spitak Earthquake. More than 100,000 residents were left homeless, and plagued with unemployment and rampant poverty for years to come. In turn, the fate of children in Gyumri has also been affected. Dealing with the difficulty of finding means to feed and care for their families, many parents are unable to provide their children with the proper guidance, supervision, educational aid and the financial resources for them to excel in school and have successful futures. The Debi Arach Children’s Center, which in Armenian means “moving forward,” helps these socially vulnerable children through a holistic approach providing them with both humanitarian and educational support. The center provides counseling and group therapy with a psychologist on staff, homework help and tutoring for almost every subject the children learn in school including English, Math, Art/Design, and Computer classes. Additionally, they are served a nutritious meal everyday, helping them receive the calories and/or nutrients they would otherwise not have. Furthermore, the Center addresses a very important hygienic need by providing the children in attendance with supervised bathing facilities. The goal is to help hundreds of children develop a vision for a successful future, and to give them the skills they need to reach these goals. This project is impacting the lives of hundreds of socially vulnerable children by helping them gain the guidance and support they need in order to create greater future opportunities, and become successful individuals and good citizens.
To date, the center has already had several important successes. At least nine children have been taken out of boarding schools, attend our center and now live back at home with their families. Many of the children who were receiving poor grades in school are now achieving top scores. The children have become socially well adjusted and much more healthier than before with the continued consumption of multi-vitamins and a daily well-balanced meal. Staff trainings take place with an academic counsel of professionals from the United States and Armenia to ensure that the children are receiving the best care, treatment and methods for their development.
The center is working on funding year ten and raising additional funds in order to develop and add to the programs and classes offered with the ability to hire more educators, and get more supplies, and equipment. Funds will also be used to supplement daily activities, hold forums for guest speakers and provide educational and career planning opportunities. $92,000 is needed to cover operating costs for the Center. In January of 2017, Debi Arach successfully launched its first program within its Vocational Training Center, teaching children computer programming, 3d printing and robotics curriculum. The goal of this newest component is to provide these children with marketable job skills in order to help them work themselves out of poverty. In 2019, with the long term commitment by Dr. & Mrs. Gary and Linda Assarian (MI) the vocational training program was renamed the Assarian Vocational Training Program.
