Cactus Grants Project Proposal

Applicants Information:

Project Development regional group: Ternopil group #1

Project Mentors: Elisabeth Robles

Name of contact person: Oksana Yaremenko

Address: ____________________________ Mobile Tel:

E-mail: oksana.yaremenko@ukr.net Home Tel:

Project Team:

1) Oksana Yaremenko

2) Liza Aleksandrovych

3) Yulia Benderska

4) Ibrahim Alongetolu

Project Information:

Project name: Lending a Helping Hand

1. Project summary:

Our project team will visit Petryky’s retirement house in Ternopil for 4 Saturdays between September 1^st and October 9^th. Each visit will be for 3 hours. We have already visited retirement house, there we had a little excursion to see how and in which conditions residents live. There are 185 residents and some of them are married, someone is in love, but there are also homeless people, who are 42 or 45. We also met the psychologist, who told us how to behave with the elderly and what is the best way we can help. She also said that she could split them into 4 - 5 groups to make work with them easier. After we saw the situation in the retirement house, we decided to make arts and crafts classes, knitting classes, a chess competition, and movie night. At the end of our project we will have a concert, where we are going to give them hand made awards, made by children from schools beforehand.

Each group must consist of 5 volunteers to work with the elderly, to help them with moving, because there are people who cannot move by themselves. Also these 5 volunteers must be prepared for the first official introductory visit, when there will be some trainings with the elderly. Also, we want to communicate with them face to face, in another words we want to make an adopt-the-elderly visit to talk to them and do activities with them and to help them feel needed. There are 2 residents in each room, so 1 person can speak with two people at the same time. Also in such meeting with the elderly we can bring them some snacks and cookies, to make our conversation more comfortable.

2. Project goals and objectives:

   • Visit elderly residents who do not receive attention very often.

   • Organize interesting events that will help us and the elderly understand each other.

   • Provide more activities that will make the elderly feel younger and active.

   • To encourage pupils and students to volunteer in the adopt-the-elderly program and be active in their community.

3. Need statement: (why is this project necessary?)

When we think about the elderly, the usual image comes to our minds: the old granny, who’s sitting at the couch and knitting all the time, or the old grandpa, who’s reading the newspaper and watching the TV. Some of the elderly do that, but unfortunately the number of such situations is quite low. There are more old people, who have no food, place to live, relatives or they are even unable to stand. That’s why people created retirement houses.

We have Petryky’s Retirement house in Ternopil. But the problem of the attention to them has not been solved yet. At the retirement home the elderly do not have many visitors come to see them, it is important for them to feel needed and young and active. There are also homeless people at this home and it would be good for them to feel like they are part of their communities too. But, what if we became the same old person in the Retirement house in the future? By making our project we can say that the elderly need help and attention and to be part of not just the community, but to all society! It will provide giving attention to us in future. That’s why our project is necessary, to pay attention to the elderly needs and by organizing different activities and competitions that will make their lives better.

Also daily physical and mental activities are necessary for all people but especially the elderly because it is important for them to use their minds and bodies so when our team will visit the retirement house we will be helping them with these types of activities. We will have them move around the retirement house and we will be playing games, music and doing arts and crafts with them. This is great for their health!