SOS Children's Villages is an independent, non-governmental and social development
organisation, which has been active in the field of children's needs, concerns and
rights since 1949. Its activities focus on neglected and abandoned children and
orphans, as well as disadvantaged families.
If a child cannot stay with his/her biological family, his/her right to care,
protection and equal opportunities should still be guaranteed. This is the basic
principle according to which SOS Children's Villages carries out its activities in
132 countries and territories. SOS Children's Villages makes it possible for
children to be part of a family once again by providing family-based care.
SOS Children's Villages are the main focus and point of departure for the organisation's global activities. Every SOS Children's Village offers a permanent home in a family-style environment to children who have lost their parents or can no longer live with them. Four to ten boys and girls of different ages live together with their SOS mother in a family house, and eight to fifteen SOS Children's Village families form a village community.
In 1949, Hermann Gmeiner laid the foundation stone for the first SOS Children's Village in the small Tyrolean town of Imst (Austria). Shocked at the plight of so many children left orphaned and homeless after the Second World War, he pioneered a family approach to child care based on four principles.
The goal at all SOS Children's Villages is to prepare and equip the children for an independent future. Each child receives education and training according to his or her needs, so that when the time comes to leave the SOS Children's Village, they are able to stand on their own two feet and achieve the goals of self-reliance, financial independence and social integration.
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