The MOSAIC project focuses on improving the quality of social care for children and youth with behavioral challenges and legal issues in Osijek-Baranja County and South Bačka District. The project addresses a common challenge in the cross-border area – the lack of effective, community-based social care services, with institutionalization often being the default approach rather than tailored interventions that promote personal growth, empowerment, and social integration.
The overall objective of the project is to enhance the quality of social care through the development of innovative, sustainable, community-based solutions, strengthening multisectoral and cross-border cooperation, and exchanging knowledge and good practices among relevant institutions and professionals in Serbia and Croatia. The project aims to shift existing practices toward models of support that enable children to overcome challenges and realize their potential within their families and communities.
Expected changes are achieved through several key project components:
1. Joint training programs and practice exchange
Through joint trainings and cross-border exchange of experiences, the capacities of professionals working with children with behavioral challenges are strengthened. Social workers, psychologists, educators, and other professionals improve their knowledge and skills, harmonize intervention approaches, and share examples of good practices from both countries, earning certificates of completion.
2. Social care service contributing to deinstitutionalization
The “Uključi se / Get Involved!” social care service provides a direct, community-based intervention aimed at preventing institutionalization. Developed by the Center for Missing and Exploited Children in Novi Sad and modeled after the successful “Legosi u Centru” program in Osijek, the service provides personalized support to children and youth in collaboration with key local institutions, primarily centers for social work, to ensure their successful integration into families and communities.
3. Research and knowledge transfer
The project conducts research, study visits, and exchanges of best practices to ensure all interventions are evidence-based and aligned with contemporary standards. Collected data, experiences, and professional knowledge form the foundation for improving intervention models and developing the content of the MOSAIC platform.
4. Development of the MOSAIC online knowledge platform
The MOSAIC platform serves as the project’s central digital hub, consolidating training materials, research findings, and expert resources. The platform allows professionals across sectors to continuously build capacity, share knowledge, and collaboratively solve problems, with multilingual availability and interactive features.
5. Project management and promotion
Effective project management and promotional activities ensure high-quality implementation, strong stakeholder engagement, visibility of results, long-term sustainability, and potential transfer of developed practices to other regions.
The project’s innovation lies in its comprehensive approach, combining cross-border collaboration, knowledge transfer, professional training, and digital solutions. By adopting a multisectoral and transnational approach, the project draws on proven European practices, including the Kinderperspectief model from the Netherlands, while adapting them to the needs of local communities in Osijek and Novi Sad.
The MOSAIC project represents a sustainable and scalable model for deinstitutionalization, providing children and youth with behavioral challenges and legal issues with high-quality, individualized, and timely support within their families and communities, contributing to their well-being, education, and social integration.
The project is implemented by the Center for Missing and Exploited Children as the lead partner, in collaboration with Center for Missing and Exploited Children Osijek (Croatia), Center for Social Work of the City of Novi Sad (Serbia), and Community Service Center Osijek (Croatia), with support from the European Union through the Interreg VI-A IPA CBC Croatia–Serbia program, from February 2026 to January 2028.
