CHAVORE: A Groundbreaking Approach to Supporting Roma Children's Well-Being 

What does it take to create real, lasting change that ensures the well-being of young Roma children and allows them to grow toward promising futures? It starts with listening—really listening—to the communities themselves. In a powerful first in-person meeting, the CHAVORE team—spanning five countries—came together to turn this principle into action. 

CHAVORE, which means "children" in the Romani language, is a project built around the fundamental belief that children should be at the center of the solutions designed for them. By working closely with Roma children, parents, and practitioners, we ensure that their voices and experiences shape every step of the process, creating culturally responsive, community-driven approaches to early childhood well-being. 

Investing in the Future: Why This Matters 

Early childhood is a defining stage in a child’s life. Yet young Roma children face significant challenges—poverty, exclusion, and discrimination—that threaten their mental health and well-being. Providing the right support during these formative years is critical to breaking cycles of adversity and fostering resilience. 

That’s where CHAVORE comes in. By equipping caregivers and early childhood practitioners with the tools they need to nurture children’s mental health and well-being, we are creating lasting, intergenerational change. Our community-driven, evidence-based approach ensures that the solutions we develop are not only relevant but also sustainable. 

A Participatory Model That Puts Communities First 

Too often, well-intentioned programs fail to truly empower the communities they aim to serve. CHAVORE is changing that. Unlike many projects where communities are consulted at the start but left out of implementation, CHAVORE is different. It works with Roma communities, ensuring their voices, experiences, and expertise shape every step of the process.  

At every stage, young Roma children, parents, and practitioners, will help guide the development of innovative, culturally responsive practices for strengthening mental health and well-being from the very early years of life. From assessing needs to testing practical tools, their insights ensure that the solutions we create address real challenges in meaningful ways. 

This is more than a project—it’s a movement toward lasting, meaningful inclusion. 

Beyond Inclusion: Building Bridges for Change 

CHAVORE actively counters discrimination and fosters social cohesion. Recognizing the risks of unintentional segregation, our initiative focuses on creating safe, integrated environments where trust is built, and Roma and non-Roma children can learn and grow together, breaking down barriers from an early age. 

Additionally, we are committed to gender mainstreaming by addressing and challenging gender stereotypes and cultural norms to ensure equal voice to women, men, and children so that girls and boys alike grow up in a more egalitarian reality. 

Transforming Ideas into Action 

Throughout the project, we will work closely with Roma communities to: 

• Assess needs firsthand by engaging directly with young Roma children, their parents, and early childhood practitioners in each partner country. 

• Develop practical, culturally responsive resources and  tools that equip caregivers and practitioners with effective strategies to support mental health from an early stage. 

• Pilot and refine these approaches, validating and adapting them based on community feedback before scaling them more widely. 

• Provide training and peer-learning opportunities, ensuring that those working closest with Roma children have access to actionable, accessible and multilingual resources. 

• Foster local, national, and regional collaboration, enabling learning that strengthens early childhood support systems on a broader scale. 

By embedding these practices within existing frameworks, CHAVORE ensures that its impact is not only immediate but also sustainable long into the future. 

Looking Ahead 

As we move forward with CHAVORE, we will continue working closely with Roma communities in each of the five implementing partner countries—Slovenia, Hungary, Slovakia, Croatia, and Kosovo. In the coming months, we will develop, test, and refine new practices, sharing updates and recommendations as we expand implementation. We look forward to sharing our progress as we work together to build a future where all young Roma children have equal opportunities to thrive. 

CHAVORE is a project born inside the ISSA Network under its Romani Early Years Network (REYN) initiative as a shared collaboration between the Educational Research Institute (Slovenia), Open Academy Step by Step (Croatia), Partners Hungary Foundation (Hungary), Skola dokoran - Wide Open School (Slovakia), Kosovo Education Center (Kosovo), and the ISSA Hub . The project is funded by the European Commission CERV programme, ensuring that our efforts have the resources and support needed to create meaningful, lasting change.