On March 16, 2021, the Diema’s Dream Charitable Foundation for Orphans and Disabled Children celebrates a significant anniversary – 15 years since the registration of the organization and more than 27 works for the benefit of society!
For 15 years, Diema’s Dream Fund has been engaged in activities aimed at improving the quality of life of orphans and children with severe and multiple developmental disabilities (SMDD), providing comprehensive assistance to children’s and medical institutions for children with SMDD. Thanks to the support of philanthropists and partners, during this time more than 20,000 orphans and disabled children received assistance within the framework of charitable programs of the foundation, 369 courses of treatment and rehabilitation for children with cerebral palsy (cerebral palsy) were paid, more than 700 families received support from the Foundation’s specialists.
The foundation’s history began with the trip of a group of volunteers, including Mary Dudley, Chair of the International Women’s Club, to one of the boarding schools for mentally retarded children. Seeing the conditions in which children were kept for years – in a confined space, without toys, walks, elementary attention and care – Mary began her activity to save children, which in 2006 led to the creation of the Diema’s Dream”.
At the same time in the south of Moscow, the Center for Social Habilitation for children with SMDD Diema’s Dream began to work. Parents with children with developmental disabilities aspired here not only from Moscow, but also from other regions. Here they did not refuse to help children even with the most difficult diagnoses, the most allegedly “unteachable and hopeless”. Over the years of the center’s work, specialists from the Diema’s Dream Center for Social Habilitation have conducted more than 31,000 consultations and classes for children with severe and multiple developmental disabilities. Since 2011, under the auspices of the fund, a unique program “Gorodok” has been created, aimed at creating family conditions for living, social adaptation and integration into society of people with special needs, which were attended by 100 young disabled children. The Foundation has been actively involved in the issues of accompanied accommodation.
Elena Volodina, director of Diema’s Dream Foundation: “There are children who need our help, and there are their parents who are desperate to find this help. 
There are orphans living in orphanages for mentally retarded children, who are still considered “hopeless”, “hopeless”, and even experts do not always understand how to include such children in the learning and socialization process. And if in Moscow the attitude and services rendered to such children have significantly changed for the better, in the regions there is still work to do. Our common goal is to help every special child to discover and realize their potential, to find new opportunities and, at the same time, the joy of life. And to each parent to return faith in himself, his child, to give hope. ”
Since 2013, the Foundation has begun to actively support the work of Portage, canis therapy and verticalization specialists. As a result of the Conference with international participation “Innovative projects in working with children with disabilities” and a series of seminars on the basic principles of Portage, with the support of the Fund, 15 teams of Portage specialists are successfully working in Russia in 5 regions. Thanks to classes with children with TMNR using the Portage method, in 2020 alone, 160 children acquired more than 1,050 vital skills and abilities in the field of cognition, speech and communication, self-service, movement, socialization, as well as the skills of an infant. For many children, it was impossible to achieve such success without participating in the fund’s projects.
In 2019-2020, despite the difficult period of the coronavirus pandemic, it was possible to train, inspire and unite new teams of specialists. In 2021, with the support of the Foundation, the “Portage Specialists Association” was created with the aim of ensuring high standards for the provision of social services and the exchange of experience and the development of innovative and effective methods of working with children with severe and multiple developmental disabilities in Russia.
Fund innovative projects
Children’s Success Stories Portage
Interview with Elena Volodina, head of the foundation, within the framework of the New Dimension program of the Vladimir Potanin Charitable Foundation
We express our sincere gratitude to our benefactors, specialists, volunteers, friends and colleagues! Your support is the main value that creates the vector of the Foundation’s development – the possibility of more effective assistance to our wards, an incentive to move together to new heights!
Foundation website https://ddfrussia.ru/
Foundation Youtube channel https://www.youtube.com/user/DiemasDreamFund/featured