This breakout will investigate ways that God speaks to His people and examine how we can respond to Him by understanding the universal theory of communication and that every living being or entity communicates.

The author of all life has so much to say and promised that He would not leave us as orphans but that He would come to us. Hearing His voice is our great privilege and listening to what He said our great mandate.

We will examine the scriptures to see how Jesus speaks and look at what they say about how we should respond. We will leave some time during this session to practice hearing His voice. John 10:27 My sheep listen to my voice; I know them, and they follow me.

How do I join the WWO movement? What can I do to further progress in the country that I am in?

The WWO Roadmap has been developed to help you answer these questions and more. Drawing on the combined experiences of those God has used in this movement, the Roadmap provides the guidance and tools to help you in the journey toward seeing orphans experience safety, permanence, and well-being and to become sons and daughters of the King of Kings. This workshop will introduce the main elements of the Roadmap and how it can most effectively be used. It will help you understand the importance of collaboration, prevention, intervention, and self care.

One way of contributing to A World Without Orphans is to have a world free of violence against women and girls. This can be enhanced by providing Life Skills for boys which lead to appreciating that abuse of women and girls is unacceptable. By starting with education when boys are still young, the potential to grow into men that will have this positive intrinsic value within them increased greatly.

World Vision implemented the Coaching Boys into Men program in Uganda and had this wonderful results …. at the beginning, 41% of the boys thought abuse of women and girls was unacceptable, and after the simple 12 week sessions, over 90% believed such abuse was unacceptable.

This choice session seeks to motivate church groups to adopt this simple but global proven model of Coaching Boys into Men. Knowledge and skills will be shared on how to implement the Coaching Boys into Men program.

Children and Youth who come from a difficult background, have often experienced traumatic events in their lives that have left them psychologically troubled from the impact of that trauma. Science has clearly identified that trauma has the potential to impact every developmental domain of the child, causing multiple challenges for the caregiver and child.

Research on the brain shows that trauma can change the architecture of the brain and how trauma focused strategies can help new neurons fire together and wire together creating a new architecture which can be the steps to healing.

You will be given access to a 3 hour trainer guide, handouts and power points in this session that you can reproduce and deliver to your own WWO network.

Orphan Sunday is a God-given tool for turning the hearts of Christians to orphaned and vulnerable children. What began in 2002 in a small, hard-pressed church in Zambia today has been observed in tens of thousands of churches in over 90 nations.

Hear from a panel of leaders about how they have used Orphan Sunday to transform culture and children's lives in their nations! The Orphan Sunday Toolkit is included in the WWO Roadmap, and this session will address how to apply that toolkit to see real change for children. Come expecting!

Launched in 2013, Home for Good is a rapidly growing national movement that is mobilising the church to find homes and support families. This showcase will explore their model of church engagement, suite of support programmes, and their approach to working with the Government. We won’t just focus on our successes; we’ll also be open about the lessons we’ve learnt along the way and be honest about the hurdles we are facing – with the hope that you may have experiences and expertise that can help us overcome them We believe the Church is well placed to make a difference! !

The goal of Child Welfare and Child Protection can be broken down to three areas: Safety, Permanence and Well-Being of the child.. This session will explore all three areas and identify different strategies that can help a child

1. 1. Feel Safe.
2. 2. Bring a Focus and Strong Value System of Permanency (Family-Based Care) to your colleagues, programs and churches.
3. 3. Well-being Needs Met and Sustained.

This panel of experts will bring their own perspective to this session and will help you walk away with concrete strategies to use in your own ministry work.

This session will focus on the relationships within the home and the space provided by this for fulfilling God’s purposes.

The objectives of this session are:

1. 1. To understand the uniqueness of family relationships of the Greatest Commandment in the context of the Great Commission.
2. 2. To explore the power of family relationships in passing on faith from one generation to the next, with special emphasis on seizing/creating the family faith moments.
3. 3. To challenge on discipleship of the home as an integral part of the corporate church’s discipleship structure.
4. 4. To highlight the devastating impacts of the neglect of discipleship of the home and introduce tools for launching serious conversations on making it an integral part of the disciple-making structure of the church.

“Can anybody hear me??”….

We’ve all been there. You have a story, a work, a passion you long to share but you struggle to raise your voice above the noise of the world.

In this skill building session a panel of experts will help you understand how to develop a compelling story using your smartphone, camera or tablet to capture a moment, and then put it together in a way that brings awareness to the needs of orphans.

You must bring your camera, computer/device to this session in order to participate. You will receive a certificate and directions on how to use many different types of tools to enhance your presentations.

The Planning Alternative Tomorrow with Hope (PATH): This choice session is designed to provide a powerful, interactive, strength-based & fun planning tool that can be used on an individual, family, community, church, regional or national level to engage key people in planning & collaboration towards a mutual goal.

The presenters have used this evidence-based planning tool on an individual basis for persons with disabilities and on a program/region basis to ramp up services for persons with disabilities in Kiev and Kherson, Ukraine and for training centres in India and Ethiopia.

When so many organizations are vying for limited resources, it is critical to be able to have a clear vision for the future and tangible goals and steps to find the right resources at the right time with the right people to reach this vision. The PATH planning process provides a roadmap for future activities in the near term, mid term and long term. You will be given the opportunity to prepare your own beginning PATH as a starting point and walk away with resources that will enable you to conduct a PATH session back home. It is recommended that you attend this session with at least 1 or 2 other people from your family, program, region or nation to maximize the transfer of learning process.

Jesus was committed to bring the Father’s love to us. As His love was/is released to us, so also we must release His love to others. When the Father’s love becomes a burning force within the hearts of men, women and children, it will become an unstoppable force encompassing every vulnerable child. This session will include opening statements by the three panelists focusing on strategies they have used to introduce the concept of the Father’s heart in their ministry. This will be followed by small group discussions in three areas:

1. 1. Distinguishing the Father’s love from the Father’s heart.
2. 2. To explore the power of family relationships in passing on faith from one generation to the next, with special emphasis on seizing/creating the family faith moments.
3. 3. Brainstorming practical strategies to use in ministry to increase commitment in bringing the Father’s love to the fatherless.

INNOCENCE is a universal characteristic that children have. This innocence leads them to naively trusting everyone, therefore making them susceptible and vulnerable... in most cases to people that should have been protecting them.

Teaching children to say “NO” helps to empower them and keep them safe. The primary objective of the choice session is to discuss and share practical ideas of how they can differentiate safe talk and safe touch against unsafe talk and unsafe touch and thus build their assertiveness; especially in cultures were children are asked to “be seen and not heard” in the name of respecting elders.

The discussion will explore practical ways to teach them how to say “NO" without “insulting” their culture. You will be given access to tools to help you in your own ministry.

Are you working to persuade others to support family care for children? Are you interested in receiving quality guidance that informs your family care practices?

Faith to Action provides best-practice educational resources for Christians caring for orphans and vulnerable children. Join our workshop to receive guidance and learn how our family care resources will help you educate others (and perhaps yourself!) on the importance of strengthening families, understanding the best models of care, and transitioning from an orphanage to family-based care. Workshop attendees with receive Faith to Action’s resources and advice for engaging key Christian stakeholders on implementing best practices in caring for children.

Undeniably parenting a child who has experienced trauma brings us to the end of ourselves, but to the beginning of a fresh hope and strength in the Lord. There is a great need for ongoing encouragement to prepare and equip parents to love children in all seasons.

What are the secrets of sustaining love for the long haul? In this session, which covers key content from the WWO Roadmap, participants will learn from an international panel of parents who will share practical and inspirational steps to finding and maintaining life-long strength and rest. Time will be given for discussion and reflection.

Maltreatment overwhelms the child’s capacity to cope elicits intense physical and emotional reactions and is almost always experienced within the context of the relationship with the child’s caregiver not fulfilling their responsibility to keep the child safe from harm.

This session will enhance our understanding of the types of child maltreatment and how it contributes to trauma, the impact of complex trauma on the life of a child and provide tangible tools to help minimize the long-term impact of harm to the child.

The panel of three experts, you will better understand the following:

1. 1. Impact maltreatment has on the child’s development and lifelong relationships
2. 2. How maltreatment changes the child’s world view and capacity to learn
3. 3. How maltreatment effects the attachment capacity of the child

Persons with disabilities in countries around the world have a variety of life experiences from exclusion, segregation, integration to inclusion.

While we want to avoid practices that exclude or segregate, we often “settle” for policies and practices that promote integration – being “in” the community but not really “part” of the community in a meaningful fashion. We know that integration doesn’t necessarily equate to meaningful inclusion in all aspects of a person’s life.

This session will explore ways and means of including children with disabilities (and their families) in the “real life” of the community. We will deconstruct some of the age-old myths about persons with disabilities as an important first step towards inclusion. Our international panel of experts will explore their community’s journey towards inclusion; what works and some of the barriers to address along the way.

Measuring program elements, including desired outcomes and community context, can be keys for better designing effective programs and improving outcomes for orphaned and vulnerable children and their families. This session will focus on providing tools and indicators to accomplish those goals. Highlighted will be the Child Status Index (CSI), a simple, cost-effective case management tool to be used by home visitors to assess the wellbeing of children, as well as indicators for both INSPIRE, a global call-to-action to end abuse, exploitation, trafficking, and all forms of violence against children, and for the process of deinstitutionalization. The data collected through these tools and indicators can be used to improve program outcomes. An on-the-ground perspective of the value of such activities and tips for implementing them will be included.

If you have a desire to help vulnerable children, no matter if they are from an orphanage or a broken family, you will most probably face the issue of insecure, troubled attachment in the child.

This session will help you better understand the importance of healthy attachment, how this is formed and why attachment is so important in order for a child to heal from the different traumatic experiences in their life. You will receive tools and strategies from the panel of experts to assist you in building attachment between you and a vulnerable child. Please bring your questions along as we want to give enough time during the session to answer them.

Is your organization pursuing a path to family strengthening and reintegration? Practitioners of this work will highlight evidence of a proof of concept that has been sustainable for over twenty years within Zambia. Our practice in Zambia has positively impacted the lives of over 4,500 children and families. Come hear about this continuum of care and learn how to contextualize this proof of concept to your respective organization and countries.

It is recommended you attend Part 1 and Part 2 of the Re-Integration Choice Sessions.

Love Justice International (LJI) works in 14 countries in Africa and Asia implementing a human trafficking prevention strategy called "Transit Monitoring." In this strategy, our staff stand in key transit locations (bus or train station, airport, border crossing, etc.) and look for signs of trafficking and use a questioning protocol to identify real trafficking cases, and attempt to "intercept" potential victims to prevent them from being trafficked. LJI's work has intercepted over 19,000 individuals around the world. These victims provide key intelligence that helps us better understand trafficking networks and bring traffickers to justice. Our work has resulted in the arrest of over 700 individuals involved with human trafficking.

LJI also operates 17 Family Homes that care for orphaned and abandoned children. Though we agree that the vast majority of children's homes fail to create an environment in which children thrive, we believe that this is because those homes fail to understand, empathize, train on, or measure any of the crucial environmental factors or parenting practices which have been scientifically demonstrated to help kids thrive. We will share about key aspects of this program, along with data from objective measuring tools indicating that the children in our program are doing better than their peers in several crucial outcomes, despite the fact that our children were orphaned or abandoned by their parents.

It is hard to engage government and produce consistent, sustainable results. It is even harder to orchestrate results-based solutions between government and the church on a nationwide scale. Learn practical, real-world solutions and strategies from experts on the ground who are making it happen now.

The panel of experts can help you understand how the challenges have been overcome in their country and give you ideas to use in your own country.

Collaborating with faith networks is key to ensuring all children can grow up in safe nurturing families. Such collaboration can help mobilize foster and adoptive families and rally others to provide informal social support to families to prevent separation or enable reintegration. In this session you’ll learn more about the important role faith communities play in the provision of family-based care. Drawing from a range of examples, we’ll look at strategies and key learning that will equip you to tap into faith communities in your country and activate the church’s mandate to strengthen and care for vulnerable children and families.

In orphan and vulnerable children’s ministry, we often work with children and youth who lack the basic life skills needed for successful transition to adulthood. Parents, caregivers and ministry workers all have the opportunity to teach these important skills to youth. This 2-part “training of trainers” session will explore the issues and challenges of preparing vulnerable children for independence and introduce you to the 9-part curriculum called ‘Life Skills for Youth’ which was designed to teach orphans and vulnerable children the skills they need for independent living.

At the completion of this certificate course, you will receive all the training modules (50 – 1 ½ hour lessons), as well as power points so you can design a training activity or program for vulnerable, exploited or orphaned youth in your region/country. You will need to register for both Part 1 and Part 2 of the Life Skills for Youth.

Come learn how churches and communities in every nation can use the most effective programs in the world, as highlighted in the WWO Roadmap, to protect children from the root causes of orphanhood and vulnerability.

This session will help participants identify these programs from INSPIRE, which are evidence-based resources (available in 10 languages) for everyone committed to preventing and responding to violence against children and poverty – from grassroots, to faith leaders, governments, educators, and the private sector.

The session will also highlight World Vision’s experience using INSPIRE in Uganda and other countries, to show how faith leaders and churches can strengthen families and help children thrive by using programs that work, from each of these key areas: Implementation of Laws and Policies; Norms and Values; Safe Environments; Parent and Caregiver Support; Income and Economic Strengthening; Response and Support Services; Education and Life Skills.

Now more than ever it’s important to know how to appropriately and effectively navigate country policies, and engage with relevant government leaders and legal authorities in the communities where you serve. When you better understand policy and legal frameworks you can be a trusted resource, an essential partner, and ensure that what you do is appropriate and aligned with country policies and standards. This 2-part panel of experts will provide an overview of current international policies and programs that affect global child protection and care, with country-specific examples to help you learn how you can effectively engage with the relevant leaders and authorities to promote safe, protective family care for children.

Keeping a team cohesive can be a major challenge for the team leaders of a Without Orphans program.. Commonly values and ideas lead to differences where conflict can surface. In this choices session, the leaders will share their experiences and ideas in developing, maintaining and supporting a team of passionate servers - who are working together collaboratively and cohesively for a World Without Orphans in their own country.

Successful collaborative team building is critical when implementing the WWO vision at the national and regional levels. This session will explore how to form and develop a team of advocates, champions and practitioners with vision for engaging churches, NGOs and governments. We will explore the important practical steps in the team building journey and reinforce the importance of intersectionality of the practical, relational and spiritual dynamics in ministry.

Often we focus on the life of orphans and other children at risk while they are still children under 18. However, sometimes we forget the enormous amount of challenges that awaits these children when they enter their young adult life.

When children start to learn how to walk, parents are guiding their first steps balancing between enough freedom to allow the learning process and enough safety for a child not to be hurt. The same way, youth while taking first steps into adult life need guidance, encouragement and safe space to make mistakes and learn.

In this session we will look at the challenges of transition into adult life, as well as, we will learn how we can guide children when they are leaving care. Program models will be examined.

Children can personally know and experience the Heavenly Father, even from the youngest age. We'll discuss why this is so important, especially for orphan children, and we'll examine practical ways to help children connect with God, walk in their God-given identity, and experience healing and comfort from Him.

Session Objectives:

1. 1. Participants will gain understanding of the importance of a heart connection to the Father and the difference this makes for the child at risk.
2. 2. Participants will be equipped with practical steps in leading children of all ages towards making connections to the Father, experiencing spiritual transformation and receiving their true identities as sons and daughters.
3. 3. Time will be given for sharing experiences and collaborating for the various ministry environments and conditions represented.

Leaders are good at meeting critical demands and mobilizing others to do the same. Sadly, we’re not as good at prioritizing our own needs. This inevitably leads to burn out, because we’re giving from an empty cup. In this session, we’ll address how we can care for ourselves spiritually, emotionally and physically. A panel of seasoned leaders in different spheres will talk about how they personally maintain a vibrant walk with the Lord. They will also address how they put guard rails in place to prevent burn out.

You will receive practical tools that will equip and strengthen you so that you can finish strong and accomplish all God has purposed for you.

To say, “All you need is love.” This is often the message given to those wanting to receive a child from a history of trauma, loss and abuse. Yet that is not going to bring success to the building of a safe, permanent and healthy home. Much more is needed: training, coaching, support, self care, and yes of course - LOVE.

Scars to Stars Foundation is an orphan family support group launched in 2007. It comprises individuals aged between 15-35.

When Sonnie lost her last parent at the age of 18, She realised this age is the forgotten generation in orphan and vulnerable children care. What happens when parents die while one is a young adult? Is an 18 year old beyond parental care? What age is okay to be orphaned or to stop living in a foster home? Our mission is to create awareness on the plight of young adult orphans and mobilize stakeholders in society to embrace and empower aged out orphans to become great achievers through counselling or emotional wellness, Empowerment, Education and ensuring Equity and Equality.

Many Christians and churches are tempted to think James 1:27 is meant for some special churches to care and demonstrate. How do we help these Christians and churches become aware that James 1.27 is for the whole body of Christ and there is responsibility that goes along with this.

As some zealous and passionate Christians and churches are responding to James 1.27 without the leadership of the Holy Spirit, the result is frustration, burnout and loss of interest.

This session is to mobilize church leaders to prioritize James 1:27 in the church's mission, values and vision. It is a constant reminder that the challenge of orphans and widows is always with us and ABBA Father wants us to consistently care for and demonstrate James 1:27. In all our honorable efforts to care and demonstrate James 1:27, we must be led by the Holy Spirit, the comforter whom our Lord Jesus promised that our Heavenly Heaven would give us.