Gheorghe Hagi and five top bloggers visit beneficiaries of The Future Starts at School programme
UNICEF Romania Goodwill Ambassador Gheorghe Hagi and well known bloggers Cristina Bazavan, Dan Dragomir, Alex Ciucă, Toma Nicolau and Adrian Zăbavă visited the community of Făurei in the county of Constanţa, which is being supported by the UNICEF campaign The Future Starts at School. Between December 15, 2010, and January 15, 2011, UNICEF organised its first online fundraising campaign, The Future Starts at School, to prevent dropout and to help children in financial difficulty to continue with their education. The campaign was successful, both in terms of online donations and posts on the topic, attracting over 62,000 fans to its dedicated Facebook page. Twenty-six major bloggers wrote motivational stories to support the campaign, about how school had influenced their lives and careers. Cristian China, Dan Dragomir, Cristina Bazavan, Bobby Voicu and Alex Ciucă were the authors of the five most captivating tales posted online. Only Cristina Bazavan, Dan Dragomir and Alex Ciucă were able to visit Faurei the community that will benefit from the fundraising campaign. They were accompanied by representatives of the other two winners: Toma Nicolau on behalf of Bobby Voicu and Adrian Zăbavă for Cristian China. The guests visited the school and the community of Făurei, and talked with parents and teachers as well as the children who will be helped the most by the fundraiser. In conversation during the visit, UNICEF Romania Goodwill Ambassador Gheorghe Hagi said, “Education is done in schools and our role as parents is paramount. We must encourage our children to give school the due importance and studying its value. However, the role of teachers is the most important. They must know how to get children to engage in studying and help them make the right choices to succeed in life. Get a child to study and he or she will be enriched. When I learnt a second language, I felt like a different human being. A whole new universe had opened up to me.”
Florina Vişan, a teacher at the school in Făurei, commented, “Before this project, when a child stopped coming to school, I would leave him or her alone. Now I have learnt how to work with parents, to persuade them to send their children to school and make them aware of how important it is for their future.” Football star Gheorghe Hagi threw his weight behind the online fundraiser campaign The Future Starts at School and spoke about the importance of education in the lives of children. He also signed T-shirts for the winners of the online contest which invited people to post on Facebook about how their formal education had helped them in their personal and professional development.
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