The Federation operates an expanding network of children’s homes for both orphans and those from broken families—a holistic, warm environment where these desperate children not only heal, but thrive.

Jewish families have not escaped the high rate of unemployment and poverty ravaging the Former Soviet Union. Numerous marriages have broken up, leaving children in the hands of caretakers or single parent homes that can’t make ends meet. Many of these children’s parents become alcoholics and chronic drug users who end up in prisons or mental homes. As a result, the children are left neglected in state orphanages or with an aging relative too frail or ill to care for them.

Adoption is almost never an option as these children are not infants and are usually claimed by some family member who will never fully release them for adoption. More often than not, they end up on the street, living in filth, sleeping on the icy sidewalks, and spending their days stealing, smoking and begging instead of attending school.

The Federation has already built and is successfully running children’s homes in cities such as Moscow, Dnepropetrovsk, Zhitomir, and Almaty, staffed by state-certified professionals.

Each of these shelters provides loving house parents, psychological counseling, medical treatment, three nutritious meals daily, attractive bedrooms, modern bathrooms, new clothing, game rooms, field trips and cultural enrichment. The children attend the local Jewish day schools, enabling them to adapt to mainstream society by mingling with children outside the orphanage. In the summer they attend Federation day or sleep-away camps, where they swim, do arts and crafts and enjoy outdoor activities.

Federation professionals do not wait for referrals; they actively seek out children in need. In Moscow, and other large cities, special teams of municipal social workers and FJC staff take to the streets on night patrol, with food, information and an open invitation to ‘come home.’

Dozens more are needed. The need is dire.

For an index of Orphanages click here