This is a fundraiser for the work of assisting Ukrainian refugees in the Cieszyn area, Poland.

Make a donation:

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There are up to a 1000 Ukrainian refugees currently living in the Cieszyn area. These are mostly women, children, teenagers and the elderly. The vast majority are lodged in private people’s homes, some are sheltered in temporary group accommodation, like hotels and college dorms.

For many, Cieszyn was a random choice, or an outcome of quick decisions with little time for deliberation. They arrived distraught and disoriented. Only a minority had some friends or family living here, only a small minority have some conversational Polish. Many had never traveled outside Ukraine before. Most left behind their closest family members. Some are minors who came with friends rather than family members. Many come with special medical or educational needs, their own, or of their children. Some continue to be torn between relative security here and the urge to return to Ukraine to contribute to the war effort or to see if they can pick up where they left off.

cieszyn

Zamek w Cieszynie. Rys. Plawgo&Pyrka

Zamek w Cieszynie. Rys. Plawgo&Pyrka

Virtually all refugees need assistance when it comes to accessing available services, registering with local authorities, registering their children in Polish schools, finding employment or temporary jobs, finding long-term accommodation, etc. For some, the circumstances of their flight and displacement, as well as the perfectly uncertain future for themselves and those they left behind, left them overwhelmed, unable to adequately meet the requirements of their new situation here. It is clear that all refugees need programs, activities, spaces, and above all people who would continue providing emergency assistance, facilitate welcome and gradual integration of the newcomers with the Cieszyn area residents.

The Krytyka Polityczna Clubhouse in Cieszyn hope to respond to these needs by creating a center for voluntary action and developing a series of programs and activities that would serve the newcomers and the Cieszyn residents alike.

In order to achieve this, we need your help.

– We plan to hire people for positions of coordinator of the center, and an assistant-interpreter. We plan to recruit and give basic training to volunteers who would act as guides and intercultural facilitators to Ukrainians living in the Cieszyn area.

– Starting in April we are launching amateur theater classes for Ukrainian teenagers in the KP Clubhouse.

– We plan to organize support groups for Ukrainian women and for residents of the Cieszyn area who host refugees or who have offered on-going assistance in other ways. To do that we plan to invite psychologists, sociologists, activists working in migration studies and others from the local community and beyond to offer seminars and workshops and to lead integrative activities and meetings.

– As Granica dla Granicy and KP Clubhouse we facilitated a coming together of local NGOs, activists, representatives of Cieszyn public institutions and the local government to share experiences of providing emergency aid to Ukrainian refugees and to launch a working cooperative called Cieszyński Społeczny Komitet Pomocy Ukrainie (the Cieszyn Ukrainian Action Committee) to network around long-term assistance and integration of newcomers living in the area. We plan to organize and facilitate seminars and workshops to strengthen collaboration, to expand knowledge and develop skills needed to give necessary and relevant help.

We need at least 60 000 PLN (approx. US$ 15,000.00, or CAN$ 17,700.00) to be able to cover the costs of these activities and goals between early May and the end of December 2022.

Make a donation and help us help Ukrainian refugees make Cieszyn their new, or temporary, home.

EUR

USD

PLN

Thank you!

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