Kibble Education and Care Centre is playing host this week to two visitors from the unique Kitezh fostering community in Russia, reports the Glasgow Evening Times.

Kibble is a huge centre, which provides a range of services to "young people at risk", including the recently founded Intensive Fostering Services. These give specialist support to children and carers involved in the fostering process. The centre is based near Paisley, Scotland.

Kitezh (300km south west of Moscow) describes itself as a "therapeutic community." It was founded in 1992 as a response to the dire conditions that are faced by orphans in Russia, where ongoing social upheaval means that orphaned and traumatised children are a particular problem.

Russian orphanages are infamously bad, and the founders of Kitezh wanted to offer an alternative, while developing new methods of care and rehabilitation.

The centre has been hugely successful so far, 15 children already having moved on into jobs and further education. Several employees from Kibble visited between 1998 and 2002 to offer their skills and set up services.

Keen to keep learning, however, the leader at Kitezh and its director of education are returning the Scot's visits to see their Intensive Fostering Services.

Kibble Chief Executive Graham Bell is proud to have the visitors and commented: "We can only hope they see something we're doing which they can take back to benefit kids in Kitezh."

To read the original article, visit: Glasgow Evening Times