Development Ratings

Blue Dragon started when Michael Brosowski, an Australian teacher, and Pham Sy Chung, a Vietnamese local, began meeting, playing football and helping Vietnamese street kids in early 2002. In early 2004, Blue Dragon was registered in Australia. Later that year, Blue Dragon was registered as an NGO in Vietnam.

Blue Dragon now works with Vietnamese children who are categorized into groups as follows: children with disabilities, street children, victims of trafficking, and the rural poor. Many of them have no immediate family to care for them. Many live in boats, tents, and slums; others have no home at all. Some have family members in prison, and most have a family member with a serious illness, drug addiction, or disability.

Blue Dragon has four main projects:

1. Step Ahead: This flagship programme in Hanoi focuses on street kids and children with disabilities. The programme enables street kids and children with disabilities to return to school by providing a full range of support services, including legal advocacy, psychological and counseling services, school fee relief, and accommodation. All the services are offered in a fully dedicated ‘safe haven’ centre in Hanoi located near the Red River banks, an area where a number of street children seek refuge. The centre provides the children with a range of educational, sports and job training activities helping them prepare to join ‘normal’ life.

2. Safe and Sound: this programme focuses on rescuing and preventing victims of domestic child trafficking in Hue and Ho Chi Minh City. The programme help children escape from traffickers and return to their families, and prevent trafficking from taking place in the first place by spreading awareness in villages and communities.

3.Hoi An Children’s Home: This programme is focused on children living in poverty in the Quang Nam province finish their schooling, and go on to university, by providing a residential home with a full range of support services.

4.Stay in School: This programme in the Bac Ninh province provides support to children from the poorest rural families so that they can stay in school, by providing for all school-related costs including uniforms, tuition fees, stationery, and text books.

Blue Dragon is unique in that each child has an individual plan created through a process of negotiation between social workers, the child, and the child’s family (if any). Another defining feature of Blue Dragon is the diverse range of services they provide for disadvantaged children including: legal advocacy, emergency medical help, nutritional support, psychology groups and counseling, accommodation, tuition and homework assistance, and special classes in art, drama, music, English and swimming.

Blue Dragon is well-known on the streets of Hanoi, and it is quite common for children who already know the organization to bring new children met on the streets. In addition, Blue Dragon operates outreach programs and takes referrals from government bodies, including schools, who know children in need of help. Basically, the organization helps children as young as 5 and as old as 18. Besides, they also help kids who have been in their programme and are in the transitional phase of growing into young adults, from 18 to 23.

Blue Dragon has also set up a motorcycle rental and repair shop which is operated as a social enterprise. A number of the street kids have been trained at the shop.