Peluche

Their names are Elisa, Ali or Sara. They are between 2 and 20 years old.

For their own safety, they are not growing up in their families but in accommodations centres with lots of other children and carers.

Life in a group is restrictive, especially as these children suffer from behavioural and attachment disorders.

Fortunately, the Peluche volunteers are there to offer them one-to-one homework help and weekend trips and activities. 

Mission / Focus

In the Brussels-Capital Region, 900 children, teenagers and young adults are growing up in accommodation centres as a result of legal measures to protect them and remove them from their families. Several hundred are waiting for a place to become available.

Trauma linked to neglect, abuse or violence suffered during childhood in their biological family affects their mental and physical health over the long term. While some cope well, for many the future is bleak. Although they make up only 2% to 3% of the total population, people who have been placed in children shelters account for 1 in 4 of the homeless in France (and up to 40% of the under-25s).

Peluche's mission is to break this vicious circle by giving children placed in centres in Brussels the consideration, support and emotional bond they need to (re)build themselves. 

To achieve this, Peluche selects, trains and supervises volunteers who work in residential centres to offer each child a place of consideration, affection and ‘possibility’, which is both necessary and complementary to the institutional (and under-resourced) environment in which these children live. Thanks to the commitment of its volunteers, Peluche is fighting to give back to these children what has been taken from them : confidence in the future. That's why we call our children ‘passengers’ ; our mission is to accompany them towards the life they are entitled to.

Peluche helps to rebuild the lives of its passengers through :

•  weekly individual tutoring between a passenger (aged 6 to 20) and a volunteer, always the same one, throughout the year. 

•  leisure activities for individuals or small groups of up to 3 children for those who spend all their weekends in their shleter home. This is an opportunity to leave the institutional world behind and create a bond with a volunteer who provides security, while at the same time opening up their horizons (sport, culture, DIY, the outdoors, etc.).