Children

WACKER supports “Die Arche” (The Ark; German-language version only), a Munich-based Christian charity for the young. The initiative, which works with around 400 children and young people from socially disadvantaged families, including refugee children, provides children with hot meals and extra tutoring, organizes leisure activities and offers counseling. WACKER supported The Ark in 2015 and 2016 as well, each time donating €100,000 to the charity. For ten years, Wacker Chemie AG has been supporting The Ark’s work with an annual donation – currently the total stands at €1 million. WACKER’s commitment to The Ark goes beyond financial contributions – its employees also spend their free time as volunteers at the annual Ark Summer Festival.

WACKER’s support for children and young people at a regional level is not limited to the company’s focus on funding for The Ark. WACKER’s own Burghausen Vocational Training Center (BBiW) (German-language version only) accommodated four unaccompanied adolescent refugees from Afghanistan in its youth guest house in 2015. Along with the eight African refugees taken in by WACKER in 2014, the company is now helping to integrate twelve displaced young people. The refugees are taking intensive German classes to help them in their new life in Germany. They are also taking an integration course at the Altötting vocational school with the goal of obtaining the necessary educational qualifications for vocational training. Of the twelve unaccompanied refugee minors, six started apprenticeships with local craftsmen in 2016.