7,000 beneficiaries of the temporary care system moved to “Empowerment”

Undersecretary of the Ministry of Community Empowerment, Aisha Ahmed Yousef, confirmed that the Ministry has succeeded in rehabilitating more than 7,000 beneficiaries who moved from the temporary care system to the empowerment system.

This came during the 16th Social Service Conference, organized by the Department of Social Services in Sharjah, under the slogan “Smart Engineering for Social Service: From Professional Practice to an Influential Leadership System – Organized Awareness,” with the participation of representatives of governmental, private and semi-governmental agencies related to the social services sector in the country.

Aisha Youssef explained that moving the individual from the concept of care to the concept of empowerment requires the solidarity and integration of the efforts of various agencies and sectors, especially since the social sector is closely linked to the health, security, educational, economic and other sectors.

For her part, the Executive Director of the Community Empowerment Sector at the Community Development Authority in Dubai, Maitha Mohammed Al Shamsi, confirmed during the conference that the social sector directly touches the individual and the family, which requires the availability of the necessary tools to know the needs of community members, stressing the importance of the social vision in achieving the integration of the services provided.

She pointed out – during the first main session entitled “Social Service from a Professional Practice to a Proactive Leadership System” – that the Dubai Social Agenda (33) formed a tool for developing a vision towards better social services and advanced levels of educational and health services and social cohesion, thanks to the combined efforts of various parties. She also stressed the importance of having an interconnected digital system that monitors the current and future needs of society.

The Director of the Family Development Department at the Family Development Foundation in Abu Dhabi, Wafa Muhammad Al Ali, said that the Foundation works within an integrated system, with the aim of enhancing the quality of life of senior citizens, through a set of preventive, awareness-raising, interventional, empowerment and care services, stressing the importance of moving from social services management to impact management.

For her part, Director of the Sharjah Center for Learning Difficulties, Dr. Hanadi Obaid Al Suwaidi, stated that learning difficulties are among the hidden disabilities that often only appear during the school stage, and are represented by dyslexia and writing, distraction and hyperactivity, stressing the importance of the awareness of school staff and parents to be able to monitor indicators indicating the presence of learning difficulties in the child. She pointed out that early intervention contributes to improving the quality of an individual’s life in the long term, especially when developing a clear individual plan that later helps the child understand the nature of the problem and deal with it as he grows older.