This programme contributes to the development of Croatian society by encouraging young people to get involved in informal learning and training, but also by allowing them to gain skills and experience through hands-on work with children, something which is difficult to achieve in conventional education. The programme enables humanities students to make an active contribution towards enacting positive social change and encourages them to think about ways to further the welfare of children and adults in their local area and society as a whole.

Dynamics of Implementation

• Training is carried out according to the needs of each individual programme (usually on a biannual basis). Level I supplementary training is available every month, level II every two months and supervisions are carried out every month. At any one time, about seventy volunteers are involved in the implementation of Brave Phone´s services.

Leaders

• members of the training team at Brave Phone, experts with professional experience of work with children as well as personal experience of volunteering for Brave Phone.

Activities

• Basic education: for all interested students, prospective volunteers in the fields of phone counselling or group work with children (dependent on the programme in which they decide to volunteer) with a common grounding in care for abused and neglected children, competent parenting and influences upon children´s development.
• Supplementary education is organised into levels. Level I, for volunteers at Children´s House Borovje, is aimed at improving practical group leadership skills, fostering leadership qualities and gaining experience with different group dynamics as well as the needs of the individuals in the group. Level II consists of lectures by experts for all of Brave Phone´s volunteers, with the content being tailored to the expressed needs of the volunteers and the judgements of the team of co-ordinators at Brave Phone.
• Supervisory support is organised with the purpose of providing help and support to counsellors and leaders, in the hope that this will prevent secondary trauma. Supervisory support is also aimed at fostering volunteers´ professional growth and development, as well as improving the quality of services provided to Brave Phone users: children, parents and experts.