The Curative Community – Kamah as a Model
The Kamah Association has developed and implemented the first curative community model in Israel, and it supports and assists those who wish to deploy the model in other locations through training and supervision.
The model has two separate components – care for at-risk youth and children and care for adults with special needs – that are both implemented in practice in Kibbutz Harduf, with mutual benefit to both programs.
The Concept – Social Therapy, Curative Community
The Kamah curative community is inspired by the Anthroposophic approach and structured on an understanding that the encounter between "healthy" members and those with special needs opens the door to a journey of growth and change both for the care staff and those cared for. Curative communities based on Anthroposophic principles have been established in Europe, the USA, and elsewhere and have operated since the mid-20th century, with a wide spectrum of populations of different ages, serving people with various special needs.
What characterizes these communities as a whole is the integration of people with different types of challenges, bringing individuals together as a community and integrating them so that each person can develop empathy for others' distress and discover and express one's own strengths. The curative community creates a system of living to include active social and cultural partnership during work, studies, domestic life, and nurturing the environment and the landscape.
