Field Visits

Description of Institutions

Wednesday, April 2, 9:00 - 12:30

FW1: Asylum
FW2: Migration
FW3: Women & Migration
FW4: Homelessness

Thursday, April 3, 14:30-16:30

FW5: Violence I
FW6: Violence II
FW7: Community Work
FW8: Addiction

FW1 Asylum: SOS Menschenrechte

SOS Menschenrechte is a nonprofit association concerned with human rights and humanitarian policy. Since the mid-1990s, it has run projects in the areas of refugee support, promotion of integration, legal counseling, and human rights education.

SOS Menschenrechte employs 25 team members, 2 people doing their alternative national service and enjoys the assistance of a large number of volunteers in its various projects.

www.sos.at

FW2 Migration: migrare - Zentrum für MigrantInnen OÖ

Migrare is a center for migrants that offers free multilingual counseling on a large variety of issues relevant to migration and integration. It runs projects fostering integration and focuses all its activities on creating equal opportunities for all citizens and viewing immigration as an enrichment for society. Migrare is run by a fairly large team of multilingual, multicultural experts and counselors and supported largely by federal government agencies.

www.migrare.at

FW3 Women & Migration: LENA

LENA is a counseling center for people who currently work or have previously worked in sexual services. It offers its clients help with organizing their public life (health, social and legal matters) as well as confidential support in personal matters. LENA is part of the Caritas Austria, which receives funds from private donations, governmental subsidies or cost refunds (social work), different EC funds and other international donors.

http://www.caritas-linz.at/index.php?id=428

FW4 Homelessness: ARGE Obdachlose

The Association for the Homeless is a private association run and financed by 30 active members. It provides assistance to people affected by or in danger of experiencing unemployment and homelessness. The association aims to stabilize its clients´ personalities by fostering their self-determined participation in public life and equal opportunities for men and women. Its services include mobile support, prevention of eviction, and the provision of structured daily activities of an occupational nature.

http://www.arge-obdachlose.at/

FW5 Violence I: Gewaltschutzzentrum

The Intervention Agency of the Violence Protection Center Upper Austria was opened in 1998 and is financed by the Austrian government. It employs 12 counselors, among them lawyers, psychologists, social workers and sociologists.
The Intervention Agency contacts victims of violence after an abuser has been turned away from the common household and a barring order has been issued. It actively offers its counseling services in an effort to empower victims and to assist them in reestablishing a self-determined lifestyle.

www.gewaltschutzzentrum.at

FW6 Violence II: NEUSTART

The organization NEUSTART has made it its mission to provide help and solutions in coping with the problems of criminality and its consequences. Its objective is to support clients in developing personal goals and constructive crisis management skills. NEUSTART helps clients handle their - often traumatically experienced - past, so that they can cope with the present, find a way out of their isolation and develop a positive perspective on the future. Its goal is the successful integration of both victim and offender thereby providing a service to society as a whole.
NEUSTART employs 547 professionals. 62 % female (65.1 % of them part time employees). 971 persons work voluntarily, 59.5 % are female. The organization is largely financed by the Austrian government.

http://www.neustart.at

FW7 Community Work: Stadtteilzentrum Franckviertel

“Stadtteilzentrum Franckviertel” (District Center Franckviertel) is part of the municipal administration of Linz and fosters community work in this particular urban district. The center seeks direct contact with the people in order to assist them in voicing their ideas and finding ways of implementing them. It coordinates the efforts of the social, cultural and medical facilities in the area in its effort to enhance quality of life for all in the community and to support families in particular.

http://portal.linz.gv.at/Serviceguide/viewChapter.html?chapterid=121939

FW8 Addiction: Institute for the prevention of addictions and drug abuse

The "institute for the prevention of addictions and drug abuse" was founded in 1994 as part of pro mente Upper Austria in Linz and is nearly entirely financed by the Upper Austrian Federal Government. The 30-member team consists of psychotherapists, continuing adult education trainers, pedagogues, psychologists and communication scientists, sociologists, social scientists and social workers.
The institute aims to minimize the problems and damage arising from the use of psychoactive substances and in the context of addiction. This is to be achieved by medium-term and long-term preventive activities. A resulting sub-goal is the general increase of constitutional behavior. In addition, the institute wants to sensitize the general population to the issue of addiction and to inform them about the preconditions for the development of addictions and possible preventive measures.

http://www.praevention.at/seiten/index.php/nav.2/view.384/level.2/