Clare Hanbury

We Are All Connected

Texting Saving Lives

Here is a great video from Nancy Lubin who works with young people on social change - on building a crisis text hotline...and getting real time data on crucial issues affecting children and young people.

 

The Young Are The Ones Who Come Along To Inspire Us

Great video from 20//20 education movement - a big MEET UP in OXFORD 26th June.... and these guys worth your follow on twitter @2020education...find out more right there....

 

Involve children in the 'send my friend to school' campaign.

Thanks to Karen Garvin for this guest post....The campaign she writes about is about inspiring young people everywhere to care about and speak out about getting every child access to schooling. Reading that there are 67 million children without access to education stopped me in my tracks today. Statistics rarely move me but this one did....

If you are able to involve the youngsters you work with to join this campaign please do....

Best wishes

Clare

 

Send My Friend to School 2012 –‘Go for Gold’

In just a few weeks athletes from around the world will converge on London for the Olympics to compete and achieve to the best of their abilities. But globally, 67 million children are still held back from reaching their potential because they don't get an education.

As part of the Global Campaign for Education every year millions of teachers and students from around the world remind their leaders of the important promise they made to get every child into school by 2015. And it is working; 50 million more children are in school right now than in 2000.

But like an athlete hitting the wall, progress has faltered. With only three years to go before the finish line of 2015, we need a new surge of energy to make sure all children get the chance to take part in the Great Education Race.

If you sign up to take part in Send My Friend to School in 2012 you can get a free resource pack, which includes a DVD, teachers guide, posters and stickers to introduce your school to taking part in this important campaign. http://www.sendmyfriend.org/take-action/order-schools-pack

Your school can join thousands of others to call on world leaders to get all children into school by 2015.

This year's campaign, inspired by the Olympic Games, calls on leaders to 'Go for Gold!' for education. Creative activity and teaching ideas will help learners engage with the issues, and empower them to raise their voices with their political representatives.

There are already over 5,500 UK schools taking part this year, asking world leaders to ‘Go for Gold’ and helping to get universal primary education.

At www.sendmyfriend.org you’ll find extra information about the campaign, including lesson plans, extra videos, case studies and background material.

The ‘Go for Gold’ online animation and game sets out the issues in a fun and accessible way, ideal for home and classroom use. http://www.sendmyfriend.org/take-action/go-for-gold

On current trends over 50 million children will still be out of school by 2015. So, its vital that we send a clear message to our leaders that they need to do more.  

Send My Friend to School is run by the Global Campaign for Education, a partnership of charities and teachers’ unions, and involves young campaigners in over 100 countries.

Faith Groups Unite To Fight Malaria in Ghana

Children, Climate Change, Disasters and Disater Risk Reduction

This 4-page IDS IN FOCUS Policy Briefing (Number 23 April 2012) looks interesting for those of us interested in children's participation, climate change and disaster risk reduction..

Children, Climate Change and Disasters by Tanner, T. and Seballos, F. - 12-Apr-12 (4 pages). An IDS In Focus Policy Briefing Download this publication free of charge (1.25MB)

A Summary

Disasters pose one of the greatest threats to future generations. Children now and in the future have the right to protection from disasters and the right to participate in decision making and action to prevent disasters and adapt to climate change. This briefing uses case studies from two disaster-prone countries, the Philippines and el salvador, to outline the right conditions for child-centred approaches at the community level across the world. In order to protect child welfare and support children to realise their capacity as active citizens, urgent action is also required at national and international levels.

Children's Participation Group: April focus on Training in Children's Participation

The monthly post that distills the notes from our Children's Participation Group meeting. This post focuses on training in children's participation. (This post was written and edited by two other members of the CP group)

Welcome!

The April meeting saw us with a new member. Welcome Lisa! You’ve already enriched the group and it is great to have you on board.  The group is now what we think is a maximum size for the format which is a monthly meeting and sharing over skype.  The decision to limit discussion to one topic per session and to extend the session to an hour and 15 minutes was wise as was the decision to spend the last 15 minutes sharing what we were all up to, relating to children’s participation or not.  We also all endorsed the putting up of our discussion on a blog because we think it is great to capture key points and to share - it furthers reflection, sharing and learning. So those of you who may be reading this but were not a part of the skype discussion please feel free to add/comment/challenge the ideas and notions here.  We’ll be happy to hear from you and to widen the sharing pool.

THE DISCUSSION

The focus of the meeting was the question...When we are conducting a training in children's participation what are we training our participants to- know, be able to do and to feel? (Are there core components?)

That this is a burning issue that all those involved in CP are grappling with is evidenced by the fact that we talked about this to some extent last month but yet felt that much remained to be explored.

On training:

The issues that CP training raises are diverse and include:

Barriers, both with respect to individual attitudes (don’t believe in CP) and organisational constraints (who sometimes insist on it as a core element in the programmes run, but do not embed it within their own organisational practices and /or think they do it already).  The barriers need to be:

• Anticipated and pre-empted where possible
• Dealt with at the outset of any training programme (see ‘training strategies’ and ‘tools’ for suggestions on how)
• Shifted a little through ‘evidence’ of good CP in practice, often through a video (the group offered a rich range of links which are grouped at the end of this note for ease of access). The attitudinal ones are the most difficult to shift when perspectives are entrenched.  A leaf from coaching work might help here.  Acute and attentive listening, a ‘listening with all your senses’ is key.  We need to ascertain where participants are ‘coming from’ and, in particular, what strengths they already bring that might be built on may help them and us, see this as a ‘journey’ rather than a ‘training’ scenario.

What those of us engaged in CP need to get across, and it is debatable whether the training alone can do this, is the value in practice of CP.  And it is crucial to link CP with action in the community: action on health or education or another social aspect of childhood and life in the community.  However, there is a wider social agenda as well, as we discussed later.

The organisational barriers are equally challenging.   The participants need to be equipped with strong advocacy and communication skills to get their organisations to see either that they need to practice what they preach or, indeed to review their own policies and practices and not assume that they automatically child inclusive.   We really need to support opportunities to apply CP in practice, to reflect on practice, and to learn based on experience.  We also need to equip ‘returning’ participants with the skills to persuade or shift their organisations’ work, policies and attitude regarding the practice of CP within the organisation itself. 

So the training needs to:

Guest Post: Children and Young People - Making a Difference in Libya by Tom Shelton

I am delighted to publish this guest post: Children and Young People - Making a Difference in Libya by Tom Shelton, Communications Officer, Handicap International UK. In the post he shows how children in Libya are contributing to keeping themselves and other members of their families and communities safe.

On 21st March 2011, 13-year-old Mohamed was playing football with his friends when he noticed something glinting in the sun. Curious, he picked up the strange object and started to play with it, throwing it against a wall. It exploded violently, firing out shards of metal that struck the child’s face and hand, cutting off several fingers.

Unknowingly, Mohamed had picked up a submunition left behind after the fighting last year in his hometown of Zlitan, a coastal town in Libya about 30 miles from Misrata.

Six months after the fall of the Gaddafi regime, explosive remnants of war continue to injure and kill civilians in Libya. Children and adolescents are bearing the brunt of these accidents due to a lack of awareness of the dangers that these weapons pose. In the region, 80% of recorded casualties are under 23 years old.

Handicap International is committed to preventing such accidents by clearing areas contaminated by weapons and educating local communities about the risks. Since launching our activities in Libya in March 2011, our teams have made around 50,000 people aware of the risks. Since October 2011, we have also destroyed more than 3,500 explosive remnants of war.

Initially, our education activities targeted people who had been displaced by the fighting. These groups were particularly at risk as many were returning home to areas which had been heavily shelled and mined, unaware of the hidden danger.

Cambodian Children Speak OUT!

Just had a look at this report....it may be of interest to you. The summary is from Save the Children's Site

Cambodia Children's Report: My life. My suggestions

 The report "My Life My Suggestion" (2010) is released by Cambodian Children and Young People’s Movement for Child Rights, a network of children and youth from 20 organisations operating in 16 provinces that is supported by Save the Children.

The report highlights the dire situation that Cambodia’s children face in their daily lives and provides a number of important recommendations to engage the Royal Government in solving the problems that affect the living situation and development of children. Statistics reveal that twenty-six percent of the children surveyed said they have never received care and warmth from their parents and a quarter said they were forced to do various dangerous or unsuitable jobs, including pulling carts, performing wage labour, begging, working in rubber plantations, working at construction sites and factories, scavenging for scraps, logging and finding firewood.

Also documented is the limited extent of the country’s child healthcare services, as twenty-three percent of the survey participants stated that hospitals were far from their homes, and that health centres were small, understaffed and under-equipped. Moreover, twenty-seven percent of the children said they faced regular discrimination on the basis of poverty and race, and for having disabilities or suffering from HIV/AIDS.

The report was sent to UN Committee on the Rights of the Child in 2010 and it is hoped that the Committee will push the government to introduce measures and practical actions to ensure that Cambodian children truly become holders of all rights enshrined in the Convention.

Children as Agents of Change in Disaster Risk Reduction

Here is a publication I just came across on:

Children as agents of change for Disaster Risk Reduction: Lessons from El Salvador and the Philippines

Overview

Disaster management has been dominated by top-down relief efforts targeted at adults, who are assumed to be attuned to the needs of their families and the wider community, and to act harmoniously to protect their immediate and longterm interests. This paper challenges the associated assumption that children are passive victims with a limited role to play in communicating risks or preventing and responding to disasters.

The paper considers a history of youth empowerment through children’s active participation in decision-making forums; it also looks at whether the international human rights systems provide for children's right to protection from disasters; and finally, it asks whether children can be effective as communicators of risk within their own households and communities. Through research in El Salvador and the Philippines, the conclusion is that children are well-suited to the role of DRR advocates, as communicators of disaster risk - but an important questions must then be addressed, such as: is that desirable?

Author: Tom Mitchell, Thomas Tanner, Katherine Haynes

Partners: Institute of Development Studies

Countries: El Salvador, Philippines