“Do you have an experience supporting children affected by the humanitarian crisis in Ukraine that you would like to share with colleagues? Tell us what happened and how it turned out. Be specific and detailed so that we can understand your story.”
This was one of the questions that applicants to the Certificate peer learning programme on Psychological First Aid (PFA) in support of children affected by the humanitarian crisis in Ukraine could choose to answer.
If you are reading this, you may be one of the education, health, or social work professionals who answered questions like these. You may also be a policy maker or organizational leader asking yourself how children from Ukraine and the people who work with them can be better supported.
The Geneva Learning Foundation (TGLF), in collaboration with the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies (IFRC) and with support from the European Union’s EU4Health programme, is pleased to announce the publication of the first “Listening and Learning” report focused on the experiences of education, social work, and health professionals who support children affected by the humanitarian crisis in Ukraine.
This new report, published in both Ukrainian and English editions, gives back the collected experiences of 873 volunteers and professionals who applied to this new programme in spring 2024.
Readers will find short, thematic analyses. A comprehensive annex is also included to present the full compendium of experiences shared.
To transform these rich experiences into actionable insights, the Foundation’s Insights Unit applied a rigorous analytical process. This included systematic consolidation of data, thematic analysis to identify recurring patterns, synthesis of key trends and effective practices, and careful curation of representative experiences. This methodology allows for the rapid sharing of on-the-ground knowledge and innovative practices tailored to the specific context of MHPSS in humanitarian crises. As with any qualitative analysis, these insights should be considered alongside other forms of evidence and expertise in the field.
Experiences shared reflect the intrinsic motivation of helpers, their subtle attention to children, the magic of doing the right thing at the right moment. They also describe the personal and practical challenges helpers face when working with distressed individuals and communities, often with limited resources.
This programme, offered by The Geneva Learning Foundation (TGLF) in partnership with the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies (IFRC), employs an innovative peer learning-to-action model grounded in the most recent advances in the learning sciences.
To complement existing top-down skills-based training in Psychological First Aid (PFA), we are working with IFRC to create structured opportunities for practitioners to learn directly from each other’s experiences while applying what they learn to their own work, aligning to the best guidance and norms for mental health and psychosocial support. For professionals working in crisis settings, this offers several key advantages:
It leverages the collective expertise and tacit knowledge of practitioners on the ground.
It creates a supportive community of action, connecting professionals across boundaries of geography, hierarchy, and job roles.
It helps bridge gaps between theory and practice by positioning learning at the point of work.
It fosters critical thinking and problem-solving skills through peer analysis and feedback.
It is highly adaptable and can be implemented quickly in response to emerging crises.
This process not only enhanced participants’ understanding of Psychological First Aid principles but also built their capacity to critically reflect on and improve their practice. By engaging professionals from across Europe and Ukraine in both English and Ukrainian cohorts, the exercise fostered cross-cultural exchange and mutual learning.
As the humanitarian sector continues to grapple with how to effectively build capacity at scale, particularly in rapidly evolving crisis situations, we believe this peer learning-to-action model offers a promising pathway. It empowers practitioners as both learners and teachers, creating a dynamic and sustainable approach to professional development that can adapt to meet emerging needs.
The Foundation would like to thank IFRC, the Psychosocial Support Centre (PSC), National Societies, as well as the network of governmental and non-governmental organizations across Europe that has engaged in this new approach, as a complement to their efforts on the ground. As the programme continues through to June 2025, this report will be followed by others to share what we learned from successive peer learning exercises, folllowed by the development and implementation of local projects guided by the collective intelligence of practitioners.
We invite you to explore these insights, reflect on their implications for your own work, and consider how this approach might be applied to strengthen mental health and psychosocial support capacity in your own context.
The Geneva Learning Foundation
Image: The Geneva Learning Foundation Collection © 2024