On February 10, 1999, an unusual half page ad appeared in Israels daily business newspaper Globes. Flanked by reports of the previous days stock exchange activities, the ad congratulated Kfar Tikva on achieving the international quality approval ISO 9001.*
The standard is familiar worldwide in factories, though its recipients also include hospitals. Kfar Tikva, though, is the countrys - and possibly the worlds - first community for people with special needs to have received the recognition.
Dynamic, Brazilian-born Penkovici, director and major moving force behind the Village, not only sees nothing odd about the award, but sees it as an absolute necessity if the Village is to live up to the standards it has set itself.
If industry has to supply a certain level of services, so should an organization which gives services to groups
Achieving the award wasnt easy. Hitherto, the activities of our social workers and psychologists were free floating and non-accountable.
It took four years to change the concept of the staff that what they were doing could not be measured. Our social workers and psychotherapists didnt really like it. A lot of them left all those who were scared of accountability.
In a hospital, efficiency of treatment is measurable chemically and electronically. But how does one measure the effect of treatment of people with special needs?
Its simple, Penkovici seems to suggest. The process alters the status of the treated person from one of internee or inmate to that of patient/client a very significant change - and it is the client who determines the result.
Its name, Kfar Tikva (Hope Village), and its idyllic location, on a lush, green and secluded Galilee hilltop in northern Israel, lead one to expect a utopian enterprise. So too do its kibbutz-like buildings and the declaration that the lifestyle at this home for the mentally handicapped is based on kibbutz (Israels agricultural collectives) egalitarian and humanitarian ideals.
Nevertheless, theres nothing utopian about the workplaces, the communal dining room or the other facilities nor about Penkovicis crisp explanations about what makes Kfar Tikva tick.
Kfar Tikva was founded in 1964 as an institution for mentally retarded adults. The idea was to found a permanent home and work place for people with moderate or slight mental retardation, while assuring parents that their children would be looked after for the rest of their lives.
Since the mid-1970s the Village has been evolving into a community based on the Israeli kibbutz model. Part of this change included encouraging members to participate in the administration of the Village, and to be actively involved in all of the decision-making concerning their personal and social lives.
The Village serves a population classified as suffering from Minimal Brain Dysfunction, or as being slightly or moderately mentally retarded. Managed by a staff of about 76, including 15 social workers, Kfar Tikva currently has 145 men and women residents aged 18 and over, from all over Israel and all segments of society. In addition, some 25 people live singly or as couples in the thriving, adjacent town of Tivon, making use of Kfar Tikvas services.
Penkovici, 52, studied law before immigrating to Israel in 1970. His introduction to Kfar Tikva was as a volunteer photographer, but he later became an instructor and finally he went out to study social work and psychotherapy.
I couldnt understand why these people were in an institution, says Penkovici. In Brazil I had grown up with similar people, all going about their day-to-day lives and not living in any institution.
The more he became acquainted with the residents the more convinced he became that a revolution was needed in their lifestyle. I saw their life as one of suppression. Although I wasnt a professionally-trained person I believed that people shouldnt be told such things as when to sleep or to eat.
At that time - in the mid-1970s - the staff could decide on elementary things, such as what films to show. Admitting that he was very militant, Penkovici relates how he started to bring a 16 mm projector to Kfar Tikva to show films which the patients themselves had asked for. The first film they chose was The Exorcist, followed by Emmanuelle. These were considered hot films at the time, he says.
To illustrate an even more significant breakthrough - in the field of sexuality, until then a taboo - Penkovici stretches to a jar on a shelf behind his desk and takes out a cotton bud on a stick, used to clean ones ears. I learned that the best method to learn about sexuality of the mentally retarded is by keeping ones ears open to their wishes and demands.
Before 1975, men at Kfar Tikva used to live in one area and women in another. They could not be together after 9 p.m. As an instructor at the time, I was responsible for making sure that women and men were in their separate areas. Every room had to be inspected before lights out so that the staff could retire knowing that everyone was in his/her bed.
One night Penkovici spent hours searching the institution for a missing woman, only to discover that she was in her boyfriends room, hiding under his bed every time the instructor appeared.
I didnt approach the room any more that night. Instead, I went home thinking about mentally retarded peoples sexuality and capacity to behave in a very normal and clever way with their intention to safeguard their rights as human beings.
They were a couple many years before they received the respect and the right to have a sexual life. Today, he relates proudly, this same couple along with 19 others have their own private houses, their privacy respected by the professionals.
The more you give people responsibility in an area, the less central it becomes in their minds, he says. The right for people with mental retardation to have sexual relations is a fundamental human right but mentally retarded people all over the world have been deprived of this right. For many years sexuality among the mentally retarded was a taboo subject and many mentally retarded citizens were not given adequate information regarding their own sexuality and sexual rights.
Here Penkovici digresses to make a distinction between saying someone is mentally retarded or that he/she is a person with mental retardation. In the latter case the word person appears first, so we understand that we are dealing with a human being who has some impairments. He may have motorical difficulty or his abstract intelligence may be impaired, but in all other characteristics he is exactly like any one of us. He can be happy or sad, he loves or hates, may enjoy music, movie or theater.
It is not our goal to decide for the mentally retarded person if he/she can or should have a sexual life. Our obligation and goal should be to give them the educational tools needed so that they can function sexually as close to normal people as possible.
At another point Penkovici pulls out a partly used toothpaste tube and squeezes a drop out, suggesting that people shouldnt be written off as having nothing to contribute, until they have been squeezed.
A classic case, in which Kfar Tikva again made a pioneering move, was the issue of academic studies. In 1992 I turned to Haifa University. I spoke of the need for integrating our members in outside activities and requested that they be admitted to study certain subjects like political science and psychology, as well as degree courses.
They looked at me as though I had fallen off another planet, says Penkovici, hastening to add that actually, in all of us there are stereotypes. And, he admits, I had no idea whether people would be able to express themselves, ask questions or take part in discussions.
The University suggested having the courses at Kfar Tikva initially, but this was declined. Instead, a special study program for people with special needs was initiated at the Universitys Department for External Studies. The courses lect, notes Pencovici, was an ordinary lecturer without any particular experience in dealing with people with special needs.
The initial course in 1992 opened the academic doors to people with special needs and was an important step in the direction of normalization and the integration of this community, says Penkovici. It also helped to break some stereotypes about the capabilities of a person with special needs. The course in Haifa has been an inspiration for opening such classes in other areas in Israel as well as abroad, particularly in Spain, Portugal and Brazil.
In 1997 about 40 students from Kfar Tikva together with many other students with special needs from the Haifa region - participated in courses within Haifa Universitys Department for External Studies. Courses covered were English, Psychology, Art, Computers and Geography of Israel.
The hottest is a computer course at a technological college, providing skills which some people utilize to bring out a newspaper, says Penkovici. (As part of Kfar Tikvas leisure time activities there is a computer department equipped with 12 computers providing educational programs, games and word processors.)
Future plans call for the opening of academic or semi-academic courses for people with special needs in schools for nursing, and in computer departments and other academic departments throughout the country.
Kfar Tikvas own economic activities also reflect the Villages basic tenets:
The kibbutz-like striving for maximum self-sufficiency, and the belief that everyone, whatever his limitations, has some economic contribution to make to the community (in return for which they receive, along with all the services, a monthly allowance). Everyone has some usable skill, no matter what their I.Q., says Penkovici. The I.Q. concept should die. There are all kinds of intelligence.
In 1983, the Village initiated a project for vocational training, to help both its own residents and people from outside with mental retardation. To date more than 250 people have been trained, 80% of them non-residents.
Financing of Kfar Tikvas activities derives from a variety of sources: income
from economic activity, which covers about 30% of expenses, welfare payments and in a few cases payments by residents families.
Apart from jobs in administration and services, Kfar Tikva boasts:
The recently expanded plastics molding manufacturing factory, Tivon Plastics, which provides training and work for about 70 residents. This plant, like Kfar Tikva itself, has adopted the ISO 9002 Standard.
An on-site plant nursery that provides work and training for some 25 residents in various functions, including propagating decorative flowers from shoots through planting, cultivating and harvesting;
A kennel with accommodation for 48 dogs which provides work and training for about 25 residents and trainees. Apart from work and income, this project has an extra goal: to give the village residents an opportunity to develop relationships with the animals and a sense of responsibility for animals and pets.
A new activity is growing wine grapes (of the Cabernet and Merlot varieties) on a small site in a nearby wadi. This provides employment for about 10 people.
Having heard something of Kfar Tikvas development, Penkovicis next project - a 30 day visit to the Himalayas in September, including a visit to Kathmandu, capital of Nepal, with 40 Kfar Tikva residents barely comes as a surprise. In fact, he treats the plan as self-evident. There are two aims. One is the fun itself. The other is connected to the year 2000 that is approaching: we want people to know that they can get anywhere they want.
Reinforcing the message is a picture on Penkovicis office wall of a dog dragging an overturned elephant up a hill, with the caption: Where theres the will theres a way. So far, Kfar Tikva seems to have plenty of both.
The Village is a non-profit organization whose directorate is comprised of representatives from the kibbutz movement, professionals in the human services field, and parents.
The basic philosophy of Kfar Tikva is to maximize the individual potential, growth, personal fulfillment and independence of its residents. While taking into consideration the unique and dynamic needs of each resident, we believe it is necessary to develop and encourage a persons desire for personal identity and self esteem, and the will to form social ties with friends and family so that each person can lead a satisfactory life.
Kfar Tikva aims to present challenges, encourage creativity, give opportunities to learn and other new experiences, provide tools for problem solving, and bring each person with special needs as close as possible to controlling his own life as a person, both individually and within the community. Arie Penkovici
* The International Organization for Standardization (ISO) has its roots in the manufacturing industry and comprises more than 80 member countries.
Its goal is to promote development of standards, testing, and certification to encourage trade. The ISO series of quality system standards are intended to certify that an organization has processes capable of delivering quality products and services.