Since 2022, they have heard air raid alerts several times throughout the day and night. They know how to move quickly into a shelter when there is enough time. When there is not, they have learned to put two walls between themselves and the force of an explosion. Around them, parents and grandparents use phone apps to identify and track missiles as they decide whether there is enough time to seek safety.
People, from first graders to grandmothers, track missiles using phone apps. They have learned to recognize the different types of rockets and drones that can strike them. Based on the type of missile and its trajectory, they decide whether to run to a shelter or pray to be spared. Many shelters offer little protection against advanced supersonic missiles that leave craters in the ground upon impact. It is surreal, but it is the new normal in Kyiv.
Olena Baykur, Co-Founder of Striving For All
Olena grew up in Kyiv. She has returned to the city more than once since the war began. During an earlier visit to a school supported by Striving For All, she saw the bomb shelter after its completion. When she returned in August 2026, she wanted to see how the school community was doing and how the spaces supported by SFA were being used.
What she saw reflects a reality many Ukrainians have been forced to accept. There is destruction and uncertainty, but daily life must somehow continue.
A reality no family should have to accept
Across Kyiv, damaged residential buildings make the consequences of the war impossible to ignore. Windows are shattered. Rooms that once belonged to families are exposed. Debris and burned-out buildings remain where people once lived, worked, and raised their children.
The deepest effects, however, are not always visible in photographs.
They can be felt when a family must decide whether to leave home during an alert in the middle of the night. They can be felt when a lesson stops and students move into a shelter. They can be felt in the way children have learned to respond to danger as part of their normal school routine.
Children have adapted because they have had no other choice. Their ability to continue should not make what they are experiencing seem normal or acceptable.
“Daily realities are gruesome, but children resist and heal through art. They are growing up during war, yet they continue to persevere with our help,” Olena said.
Her words capture why this work matters. Children need a place where they can find protection, but they also need space to learn, create, and remain connected to the parts of childhood that war has not taken away.
A safer place beneath the school
In 2024, Striving For All completed the construction of a bomb shelter at a public school in Kyiv. The school’s name is being kept private to protect its students, educators, and wider community.
When an air raid alert interrupts the school day, the shelter gives students and school personnel a designated place to go. Rows of chairs provide space for them to sit together and wait until it is safer to return upstairs.
The shelter cannot remove the fear of an attack, but it offers something immediate and necessary: a safer place for children when danger threatens.
Inside, the space does not feel empty or forgotten. Brightly colored cabinets line the walls. Paintings created by students are displayed throughout the room. Ukrainian messages of encouragement appear overhead.
These details make a difficult environment feel more welcoming and connected to the children who use it.
Words that mean more inside a shelter
Along the ceiling, children can read messages such as:
- Be positive.
- Be yourself.
- Set big goals.
- Never give up.
- Believe in yourself.
- You are stronger than you think.
- Follow your dream.
- You can change the world.
In an ordinary school hallway, these would be encouraging words. Inside a bomb shelter, they carry a different weight.
Children read “Never give up” while entering a place made necessary by war. They see “You can change the world” while waiting for danger to pass.
The messages remind them that what is happening around them does not define who they are. They still have abilities, dreams, and futures worth protecting.
The stories children tell through art
The paintings displayed in the shelter were created by students at the school. They are full of color, imagination, nature, emotion, and personal expression.
For children living through war, words may not always be enough. Art gives them another way to communicate. It can offer a quiet moment to focus, express a feeling, or create something that belongs entirely to them.
The paintings do not erase trauma, and art is not a replacement for professional mental health care. Still, creative expression can be part of how children process difficult experiences and hold on to hope.
Their artwork also tells us something important. These children are not defined only by war. They are students and artists. They have ideas. They notice beauty. They continue to imagine what their lives might become.
Staying connected to education
Striving For All’s support for the school goes beyond the shelter.
SFA also helped establish a smart classroom and donated laptops for students to use. These resources give children access to digital learning and help them continue building skills for the future.
The shelter and smart classroom meet two closely connected needs. One helps protect children when an immediate threat arises. The other helps them continue learning when circumstances have already taken so much from their daily lives.
Education provides more than academic knowledge. For children living through war, school can offer routine, connection, and a reason to keep preparing for the future.
A child who needs shelter today should still have the opportunity to dream about tomorrow.
A story shared by families across Ukraine
This story comes from one school, but its reality is familiar to families throughout Ukraine.
Parents monitor alerts. Educators prepare students to move to safety. Children carry experiences they should never have been asked to carry. Then, when the immediate danger passes, they return to their lessons, their friends, and their artwork.
Their courage deserves our respect. It also asks something of us.
A shelter cannot end the war, but it can help protect lives. A laptop cannot remove fear, but it can keep education within reach. A painting cannot repair a damaged home, but it can give a child space to express what may be difficult to say.
Together, these forms of support send children a simple message: you are not alone, and you have not been forgotten.
Help Children Stay Safe, Continue Learning and Find Hope
Every child deserves a safe place to learn, create and prepare for the future.
Whether you donate, volunteer, partner with us or share our mission, your support helps Striving For All provide safer educational environments, access to technology and creative opportunities for children affected by war in Ukraine.
Together, we can help more children remain connected to their education, express themselves through art and hold on to hope during extraordinarily difficult circumstances.
Support Our Mission
Your support can help children affected by war stay safer, continue learning and look toward the future with hope.
Together We Can Create Opportunity.
