CHILDREN AT RISK

The Children At Risk Foundation – CARF was founded by Gregory J. Smith in 1992, determined to benefit the street children of Brazil by defending their rights and offering them a dignified and definitive solution so that they could live and grow within a family-oriented context and healthy social environment.

The following year, in 1993, the Brazilian organisation, Associação de Apoio a Criança em Risco - ACER was also established by Smith, later to be separated from his mother foundation 10 years later.

Today, CARF attends approx. 2000 children and young people each year through its preventive programmes at the Hummingbird Arts & Cultural Activity Centre (ECBF - Espaço Cultural Beija-Flor) in São Paulo. In 2007 CARF expanded its programmes by opening the first Hummingbird Community Prevention Centre in one of the neighbouring favelas (shanties), making it possible to attend another 300 at-risk community children. The nucleus is run by community youth who have been capacity trained through the Hummingbird project.
Today the organisation has four centres working on different levels....