Roma Education Fund Roma Education Fund R5 CONTENTS Chairman’s Message 6 Director’s Letter 9 Executive Summary 12 PART I: Grants Program 18 PART II: Scholarship Program 42 PART III: A Good Start 64 PART IV: REF Romania 78 PART V: Policy Development and Advocacy 86 PART VI: Communications 100 PART VII: Administration and Finance 110 Annexes 124 REF Boards and Staff 127 National Selection Board of REF Scholarship Program 143 Grants Table 2012 146 List of Figures and Tables 170 List of Abbreviations 172 R6 R7 CHAIRMAN’S MESSAGE in all Decade countries and we are pleased to add them to our institutional memory. You also will find CHAIRMAN’S MESSAGE many accounts of the progress REF has made within this year’s report as well as in the concluding note from the Executive Director, Judit Szira. Dear Readers, This year, I would like to convey my gratitude to Ambassador Yvana Enzler with whom the REF Board has enjoyed working. Ambassador Enzler served as the Swiss Government representative on the REF Board This is the seventh year that I have the pleasure of writing the annual Chairman’s message. When rereading from 2008 to 2012. Having worked with Ambassador Enzler, I would like to express my special thanks for my previous messages to you, I realized that 2012 is a chance for me to report on REF’s cumulative her active involvement and support in the work of the foundation. Her diplomatic knowledge as well as developments over the last seven years. institutional management has helped REF to develop its operational and policy tools and has contributed significantly to the Board’s decision-making. I would also like to warmly welcome our newest Board In 2005–2006 we stressed the core activity of REF as a grant-giving foundation. By 2007 a number member, Mr. Alexander Wittwer, who joined us in late 2012. Mr. Wittwer is the Swiss Ambassador to Albania of pivotal events occurred: REF hosted the largest conference at that time on the education of Roma in and serves as the REF Board’s representative of the Swiss Government. We look forward to working with Europe, which coincided with the landmark decision of the Grand Chamber of the European Court of Mr. Wittwer in the coming years. Human Rights to rule that the placement of Romani children in special schools for the mentally disabled was an act of discrimination. In 2008 many important developments happened that have come to shape In closing my remarks, I will not say more than I said before – Romani children and youth are the primary REF today: in September the European Commission held the first High Level EU Roma Summit in Brussels; beneficiaries of our work and all of us should do everything it takes to ensure that all children are in in December the European Council committed the Commission to prepare an EU Roma Platform. As the school and have access to the same quality of education, no matter their ethnic or religious affiliation. 2012 economic crisis worsened that year, many Europeans were deeply affected; among the hardest hit were brought the Roma Education Fund one step further in achieving this and together we must ensure – in many exceedingly poor Romani communities. 2013 and beyond – that children are not denied access to education so that we may witness all of them growing up to realize their greatest potential. In 2009 it became clear that REF must capture its prior experience and success, scale up education interventions, expand the number of Roma beneficiaries, and take structural reforms to the next level in a bid to prove beyond a doubt that Romani communities were not beyond help if given the right resources, models and expertise. By 2010 it was apparent that the legitimacy of REF’s interventions over the preceding five years was key to changes in the discourse and overall political environment regarding Roma education in Europe. In 2011, the hardship brought by the economic crisis pushed us to be increasingly proactive regarding policy advocacy and bring national governments onboard; REF saw its contributions integrated into education reforms in Macedonia, Romania, and Serbia. Costel Bercus Today, I am struck by how much REF has achieved for the education of Roma in the past seven years. Chairman of the Board The foundation remains committed to accountability and transparency in the work that we are doing in the best interests of Romani children and youth in 2012. For example, in Romania, we are fighting to ensure the successful delivery of programs for Roma while facing severe bureaucratic difficulties in the management of European Social Funds. Inside you will find many stories generated from our grant projects R8 R9 DIRECTOR’S LETTER DIRECTOR’S LETTER Dear Roma Education Fund Supporters and Beneficiaries, We leave a busy twelve months behind us. 2012 was yet another year of both great efforts, important accomplishments, and, as usual, immense difficulties, especially in some countries where the situation of Romani children, and also the general political and social environment gives us reason for very serious concerns. I would like to summarize some of our most important achievements and challenges in our work towards Roma educational integration. Our first Brussels-supported project, A Good Start, was successfully completed and reported to the European Commission. In April it was summarized and celebrated in Brussels with an international conference and photo exhibition where most of our local partners together with two member of the European Parliament, one commissioner and high level experts and administrators from the European Commission participated. Most importantly we managed to ensure funds for AGS, and the REF Board accepted AGS Phase II. We will continue the intense dissemination of the AGS model and its good results. REF hosted its co-founder George Soros in the Budapest headquarters office and this event was a useful and memorable experience for all of REF staff. The Scholarship Program is now fully online and, thanks to this development, we are able to generate much needed data on our student body. For the first time we had personal interviews with all incoming students and all staff members and National Selection Board members reported the usefulness of these meetings. REF organized four Scholarship Galas for beneficiary students and, although this demanded a substantial effort, we managed to raise the attention of the mainstream media with the good news that we succeeded in having a strong student body. We had the chance to meet our scholars and most importantly they had the chance to meet each other and start building up personal and professional relationships. One result of these meetings is the most encouraging news about the REF Romania Alumni group. As part of the REF Alumni and Beneficiary Network, the development of which started in 2012, an initiative by REF beneficiaries in Romania has emerged with the aim of gathering small personal donations to provide scholarship support to other Romani students. A number of alumni members have already expressed interest in participating in this initiative. R10 R11 DIRECTOR’S LETTER In the Grant Program, REF colleagues developed and described new models and new application formats. this job. We have another new Roma professional, Dan Doghi from Romania, who is the new manager We are near the launch of the online system for grant applications and tracking as well. The themes of of our tertiary education scholarship program. We have a new colleague Azam Bayburdi in administration. our successfully piloted and evaluated new models are early childhood development, how to remedy early The composition of REF staff is 78% Roma, and we would like to keep promoting our priority of Roma school leaving in primary school, scholarships combined with mentorship in secondary education and participation at all levels in Roma-related programs. REF also would like to extend its special thanks to tertiary education. We would like to find partners in the countries to scale up and disseminate these models Elise Delinger and Mark Gomez for offering their help as volunteers to the REF Networks. In addition, REF with our financial and professional support. We managed to build up a strong and profitable professional was very pleased to host the interns Christina Marian, Jana Grajcarova, Jelena Jovanovic, Marko Pecak, relationship with MIT’s Poverty Action Lab, the best professionals in the field of impact evaluation. Orsolya Botos, and Victorina Luca. During the spring of 2012 at our retreat we had the chance to learn from their and World Bank experts about the details of measuring the real impact of some of our programs. 2012 was a challenging year, financially and otherwise. In many Decade countries fears are rising; we are witnessing how fragile democratic institutions are and we still see growing discrimination of the Roma. In 2012, REF worked diligently in fundraising; we submitted applications and we communicated substantively The equal educational opportunities of Romani children are still at unacceptable levels in the countries where with our existing donors, reporting and answering all questions. In the middle of the economic crises, REF works. Even in countries with longstanding commitments to human rights, under times of strain, REF has managed to preserve our financial status and we consider this a great result. Unfortunately, the rapid retreat from those principles can be seen. In many parts of Europe, we can feel the paralyzing effects crises are still here and REF will continue to keep our office and donation costs under control, finding of the discouraging situation. ways to accomplish more while spending less. For that we will continue to build stronger partnerships with municipalities, Ministries, and other stakeholders at our project sites.