Project Ruth
Project Ruth
"Where you go I will go, and where you stay I will stay"
Ruth 1:16
Project Ruth gives life-changing educational opportunities to poor children, especially from Roma (Gypsy) communities.
For hundreds of years Gypsies have been living on the margins of society and are still the victims of persecution and suffering. Project Ruth was started by a Baptist church in Bucharest, Romania following the collapse of communism as a response to the desperate situation of the poorest of the poor in Eastern Europe.
Who are the Roma (Gypsies)?
The Gypsies have for centuries lived on the margins of our societies. Historians have traced the roots of the Gypsy people back to India. We don't know why they started travelling, but we do have evidence that they began to leave India around the 9th or 10th century. Over the next 500 years Gypsies began to appear across the whole of Europe.
The Gypsies have traditionally been a travelling people and it is hard to pin down accurate statistics regarding their numbers worldwide, but there may be as many as 42 million spread across every country on the globe. There are probably over 1 million Gypsies in Romania, although official statistics taken from Census data put the figure at 535,000.
Gypsies are almost always outsiders wherever they live. Their distinct culture, traditional clothing and itinerant lifestyle have made them the object of suspicion and discrimination in many countries. Several official reports over the last decade (UNICEF, Soros Foundation) have highlighted the fact that Gypsies are the poorest of the poor throughout South-East Europe. Gypsy communities are almost invariably subject to all of the problems associated with acute poverty - illiteracy, unemployment, lack of access to health care, high crime rates and low life expectancy.
Project Ruth and the Ruth School
Project Ruth is working to transform Roma communities and the lives of Roma children by providing:
- Education
- Literacy programs
- School meals
- Medical and hygiene support
- Vocational training
- Humanitarian aid
- The Good News of hope
The main focus of this work is the Ruth School in the poor Bucharest suburb of Ferentari. This is where Project Ruth began as an outreach to Roma children through a Sunday school and day center in 1992. This initiative was undertaken by Providence Baptist Church.
The pastor of Providence and the volunteers involved quickly realised two things: firstly that the children were hungry - they fought over sandwiches and snacks provided for them; and secondly that they were illiterate and that most had never been to school or had quickly dropped out. These 2 key insights provided the blueprint for the Ruth School and for all the work undertaken by Project Ruth - namely ministry in Roma communities through education backed up by free school meals, humanitarian aid and health and hygiene support.
The Ruth School gained Ministry of Education approval in 1994 and is now an accredited private day school for poor and disadvantaged children offering Grades 1 - 8. In September 2006 there are 180 children on roll.
Reaching out beyond Bucharest
Building on the success of the Ruth School, we are expanding the work of Project Ruth through day centres and literacy classes in other parts of Romania. These centres are helping dozens of children to stay in school or to find a way back into the education system.
Project Ruth is also now working in Moldova, the poorest country in Europe. Our extension centres help Gypsy and other marginalized children living in desperate poverty in rural areas and in the capital city, Chisinau.
Providence Foundation
Project Ruth is run by Providence Foundation (Fundatia Providenta), a Romanian charitable organization.
Project Ruth's main emphasis is work among Roma communities but we do not exclude children on grounds of race, colour or gender, seeking instead to encourage integration and acceptance of others.