The Bahay Tuluyan and Its Junior Educators Program: Strengthening the Streetchildren’s Resilience
Maria Veronica Caparas
E-mail: maria_veronica.caparas@upd.edu.ph

The phenomenon of street children is a global concern often linked to the issue of urbanization. In the Philippines children from 7 to 18 years can be seen roaming the streets, vending, hawking for food items, begging, car-watching, car cleaning, pick-pocketing, snatching and even engaging in child prostitution. Bahay Tuluyan is an institution that has provided temporary shelter for approximately four hundred street children and has touched the lives of thousands more. It envisions a society capable of providing an environment conducive to the total growth and healthy development of children, upholding their rights and protecting them from all forms of abuse and exploitation. Bahay Tuluyan does this by adopting Programs meant to enhance the learning and creativity potentials of its residents. The Junior Educator’s Program of the Bahay Tuluyan is characterized by the child-to-child approach and its guiding philosophy “children have to make decisions for themselves.” The JEP helps streetchildren discover for themselves what they want to do in life, and strengthens them to face realities of life.

The study conducted by Ma. Veronica Caparas titled “ The Bahay Tuluyan and Its Junior Education Program: Strengthening the Street children’s Resilience” focused on Bahay Tuluyan and Its Junior’s Education Program for the streetchildren of Malate as strengthening factors of the street children’s resilience. The researcher also looked at the history, vision and goals of the Bahay Tuluyan; the special role of the staff, benefactors, and detractors of Bahay Tuluyan on the resilience of streetchildren-client; and the Junior Educators insights on the program. To meet the specific objectives of this research, the Field Research Method was employed and used the interview as the data-gathering device.