Founded in 2007, Casa do Pequeno Cidadão Nossa Senhora Aparecida (“House of the Little Citizen Our Lady of the Apparition”), is a social organization without lucrative purpose with undetermined duration, and educational and training goals.
Casa do Pequeno Cidadão’s project came about and was inspired by a pastoral movement in the community of Paróquia Nossa Senhora de Fátima da Vila Leopoldina in São Paulo. Seeing the reduced amount of out-of home care services to meet the demands of the region, Nossa Senhora de Fátima’s community held beneficiary campaigns and events to implant an out-of-home residential care service for children and adolescents zero to 17 years and 11 months old, supporting their families of origin and/or substitute families. This is the “House of the Little Citizen Our Lady of the Apparition” today. Currently, the House has cared for over 148 children and adolescents. All of them were sent through legal Brazilian entities: Varas da Infância e da Juventude, and in emergency situations, Conselhos Tutelares, in accordance with the Estatuto da Criança e do Adolescente (“Statute of the Child and Adolescent”).
About the Young Citizen Dormitory: After a decade of working with these children and adolescents, the team noticed a need for spaces to care for young adults leaving these services, who still don’t have a place to live and whose family ties were lost or are still fragile. From this concern with these citizens’ autonomy, as well as from the desire to continue to offer conditions for these individuals to develop well, the decision came about to implement a dormitory for young adults 18 to 21 years old. The República Jovem Cidadão (“Young Citizen Dormitory”) was inaugurated in December of 2018 and cares for up to six male young adults.
