Social Affairs Ministry axes at-risk girls` pre-military service project - Haaretz

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Mon., August 20, 2007 Elul 6, 5767

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Last update - 06:24 20/08/2007

Social Affairs Ministry axes at-risk girls` pre-military service project

By Ruth Sinai, Haaretz Correspondent

The Social Affairs Ministry recently canceled a program that successfully prepared 250 at-risk girls each year for army service - even as the government decries the growing trend toward draft evasion.

The ministry decided to divert the program's budget, NIS 1.2 million a year, to fund preparations for coping with emergency situations such as last summer's war.

The discontinued project was a joint venture between the Israel Defense Forces, the Social Affairs Ministry, the Industry, Trade and Employment Ministry and the WIZO organization. The Social Affairs Ministry's contribution was paying the salaries of the 10 social workers who ran it.

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Over the last few months, WIZO has pressed the ministry to restore the program's funding, but thus far, it has offered only NIS 400,000, or about a third of its former contribution.

WIZO is now frantically looking for alternative funding that would allow it to open the program as planned on September 1. However, it is also insisting that the ministry promise to fund it again completely in 2009 - a promise the ministry has thus far refused to make.

Municipal social workers have also been lobbying the ministry on the issue: It recently received a letter of protest signed by coordinators of programs for at-risk girls from every local authority in the country.

In their letter, the social workers stressed that the army-preparation program is often a last chance for the girls involved to integrate into society rather than becoming a burden on it.

The program is aimed at girls from the age of 17.5 through 19.5 whom the army has declined to draft due to their problematic personalities and behavior. It offers them tutoring to help them complete their high-school degree, professional training at a vocational school in fields ranging from computer graphics to hairdressing, and workshops on topics such as empowerment, building self-image, social integration and interpersonal communication.

After completing the nine-month program, the girls volunteer and are accepted for army service, and the program's social workers then mentor them during their service.

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1.	The financial burden	06:36	\|	steve	20/08/07

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