​We believe that it takes a village to raise a child, and a caring community plays a pivotal role in a child’s growth and development. This is especially the case for children from disadvantaged backgrounds, who often return to empty homes with little or no adult supervision after school hours. 
 
We are excited to be part of this collaborative, multi-stakeholder effort to provide a nurturing and supportive environment during the after-school hours for identified primary school children to explore, learn and grow into confident individuals. Through our partner organisations, we hope to provide these children with learning support, socio-emotional support and exposure opportunities that will broaden their experiences, perspectives and horizons, and build social capital. 

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Complementing the work of schools, the Integrated Care Programme is an upstream, child-centric, multi-stakeholder, wrap-around initiative that was first introduced in the North East Community Development Council district in 2014 to pull together social services and community support to address the needs of at-risk/needy children and their families.

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The Integrated Care Programme leverages the distinct yet complementary strengths of the various community stakeholders to match children and their families across a spectrum of needs – high, mid and low – to targeted interventions, help schemes and programmes:

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• Students in partner primary schools are first screened by trained teachers or school counsellors to identify those who may need additional support.

• ​A school social worker (from SHINE Children and Youth Services) follows up with these students and their families, recommending appropriate programmes based on their assessed needs, and connecting the students and their families to a complement of services, assistance programmes and activities run by social service agencies, grassroot organisations and the broader community.

• Partner organisations, such as SHINE and the Singapore Scout Association, will run after-school programmes tailored for identified children both in school and in the community, to build the child’s self-confidence and resilience, develop useful life skills, promote family bonding and foster a strong sense of community.