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Partnering for Children's Rights

April 2005

Introduction

This document is a synopsis of selected projects that have received funding in recent years from the Human Rights Program at the Department of Canadian Heritage to promote children's rights, including the Convention on the Rights of the Child, and to educate children about human rights in general. The names of the organizations leading the projects are provided with Web site addresses where appropriate.

If you would like further information, you may contact the Human Rights Program at: rights-droits@pch.gc.ca. Information on our Grants and Contributions program can be found at: http://www.pch.gc.ca/ddp-hrd/canada/grant_e.cfm.

Resources and Curricula

Grades 6 and 8 Children's Rights Curriculum: Re-Print and Translation
Children's Rights Centre (CRC) at the University College of Cape Breton

The CRC created children's rights curricula for grades six and eight - both curricula were in high demand. As a result of this success, the CRC has re-printed both and translated them into French. Nova Scotia has suggested that it will eventually incorporate these educational materials into its official curriculum. Making them available in English and French on the Children's Rights Centre Web site and re-printing hard copies ensures that they will be available to Canadians across the country and to those without convenient access to the Internet. For more information: http://discovery.uccb.ns.ca/children/.

Education Resource Guide for the Convention on the Rights of the Child
The Canadian Coalition on the Rights of the Child (CCRC)

The CCRC has developed a bilingual guide to the domestic and principal international educational resources available to improve understanding of the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child. It will be available in hard copy and CD-Rom, and published on the organization's Web site. CCRC will promote the guide nationally with the help of an extensive network of national non-governmental organizations.

"Hands Up!"
YMCA (Montréal)

The YMCA in Montréal revised and reprinted its publication Hands Up!: A Hands-On Approach to Children's Rights, a manual of tips for educators and childcare and youth workers on how to incorporate into community programs rights education for children (ages 3-12).

"Seeing is Believing" Teacher's E-zine and Web Site
Necessary Illusions

Necessary Illusions created a Web site and accompanying four-part teacher's resource (an electronic magazine) in English and French addressing the rapidly evolving role of new communications technologies in human rights work in Canada and around the world. These resources complement and extend the impact of a documentary - Seeing is Believing - produced with the assistance of the CBC and other partners. The guide contains lesson plans, teaching suggestions, articles, media resources, and links to Web sites. The intended audience is educators in secondary and post-secondary schools, and adult education. Topics include: the handicam revolution, cell phones in social justice, GPS monitoring and indigenous land claims, and ethical issues in uses of technology. For more, see www.seeingisbelieving.ca.

Human Rights Training for Youth

Right Way II
Save the Children Canada

In this project, youth from government care are situated in host sites - usually provincial children's advocate's offices across Canada -- and trained as coordinators in children's rights and self-advocacy skills. In turn, they recruit and train facilitators who provide "Right Way" workshops in their areas. Youth discuss their own experiences with rights; learn from each other about their rights; practise safe and effective self-advocacy through role-plays and exercises; and get up-to-date information on children's rights and referrals to community services for further information and support. Coordinators also provide support to community children's rights initiatives that arise from the workshops. In Phase II, Save the Children Canada engaged a new cohort of youth coordinators, built on the participation of youth in all aspects of the project, and expanded its sites and outreach to youth at risk and youth accessing social services.

Human Rights Training for Youth
Centre québécois de formation pour les jeunes en matière des droits humains (CQF)

The Centre québécois de formation pour les jeunes en matière de droits humains (CQF) organized a three-day training course for youth interested in learning about the human rights system. It focussed on issues such as protection mechanisms and relating human rights to the lives of youth. In partnership with the Centre de conseils et d'appui pour les jeunes en matière de droits de l'homme (Codap, Genève, Suisse), the training allowed youth to acquire basic knowledge about human rights mechanisms locally, nationally, and internationally and provided them with the tools necessary to exercise their rights.

Human Rights Training for Aboriginal Youth
Centre québécois de formation pour les jeunes en matière des droits humains (CQF)

The Centre québécois de formation pour les jeunes en matière de droits humains (CQF) organized a three-day training course for Aboriginal youth interested in learning about the human rights system in relation to the rights of Aboriginal peoples. The training provided information on human rights generally, Aboriginal rights, and the tools and methods that exist for their protection.

Children's Rights Training for Groups and Professionals

Training Workshop for Provincial Child Rights Advocates
Save the Children Canada

Save the Children Canada hosted a three-day workshop in April 2003, for Right Way partners and provincial children's advocates and ombudsman offices to offer training in how better to support and promote child rights education. The workshop included training on a child rights approach and its applications and increased their capacity to support and promote child rights education. Discussion centred on engaging and supporting young people in this work and developing regional strategies to deliver child rights education. This helped partner agencies to understand and meet the challenges of implementing youth participation in their activities. The workshop fostered the development of inter-regional partnerships to support child rights education and ensured meaningful cooperation among the partners.

Public Policy and Children's Rights
Society for Children and Youth

The project - an extension of the "Rights Awareness" project launched in 1994 - consists of children's rights workshops for professionals whose work influences public policy affecting children. The Society has developed guidelines for policy development, and a model for assessing policy compliance with children's rights. Participants in policy workshops include representatives from various government departments and non-governmental organizations. The first workshop discussed the successes and challenges faced by individuals in applying the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child in public policy development. A second six months later re-convened participants to share strategies and examples of how to implement effectively the Convention through policy, drawing on their experience between the two sessions in trying to use and incorporate children's rights in their work.

Rights of the Child in the Health Care System
Canadian Institute of Child Health

The CICH developed and disseminated revised fact sheets on the rights of children in the health care system, drawing strongly on the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child. This project is part of a larger plan to develop workshops on children's rights in the healthcare sector and teach-the-teacher activities.

Keeping the Promise
Canadian Child Care Federation (CCCF)

The CCCF, with UNICEF Canada, updated a poster on children's rights in plain language, including the full text of the Convention in child-friendly language in French and English. The poster was distributed to the CCCF's membership and network and displayed in early childhood education and care settings.

General

Newfoundland and Labrador Human Rights Association
Region: Newfoundland and Labrador
(Completed)

The Newfoundland-Labrador Human Rights Association has proposed a project to create public knowledge and awareness of human rights with a special emphasis on the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms and the Covenants on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights and on the Rights of the Child. This is to be achieved through two series of activities related to National Child Day (November 20) and International Human Rights Day (December 10). These will include public forums; a fair, educational presentations and events for all age levels but with an emphasis on youth. National Child Day activities will take place in Conception Bay South while the International Human Rights Day activities will take place in St John's.

Your Human Rights, Your Heritage: A guided museum tour
York Sunbury Historical Society

This guided, bilingual museum tour takes participants through history from a human rights perspective, interpreting century-old photographs, statues, and other items in the museum=s collection as they relate to human rights. Students, educators and members of the general community participate in a guided tour of the museum=s artifacts to discover the history of topics such as exile, expulsion, child labour, women=s rights, First Nations issues and slavery. The objective is to reveal what life was like in Canada before human rights were guaranteed and protected by law.

Le pidesc'quoi
Mise au jeu

The project will be an innovative awareness-raising tool for educating the citizens of Montreal about the rights contained in the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights. The project involves the research, scripting, and presentation of vignettes, and of live skits on public transit (buses and subways), as well as in metro stations and other public areas in Montreal. Before, during and after the presentations, the group will distribute copies of the International Bill of Rights. A video of the project will be produced so other groups can display it to their membership and clients or so they can develop similar projects.

Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms

The Rights Stuff
United Nations Association of Canada (UNAC)

As an extension of UNAC's Youth for Diversity training sessions - educating youth about anti-racism - this project added a half day to each session and dedicated that time to promoting awareness and understanding of the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms. Training will focused on presentation skills, activity ideas, and organization strategies to promote an understanding of the Charter's provisions, and link it to international standards as set out in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. The workshops are intended to reach youth in underserved and more remote centres, and all materials are being published on UNAC's Web site to reach an even larger audience.

Youth Guide and Poster to the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms
John Humphrey Centre for Peace and Human Rights (JHC)

The John Humphrey Centre developed a bilingual youth guide to the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms, with an accompanying poster. The publication includes winning submissions from a competition that invited youth to send in art works and essays about the Charter, and is being distributed to schools in Alberta, through the Alberta Teachers' Association. The guide is also being published on the Centre=s Web site and will be available on request from the Human Rights Program.

Charter Challenge Web Site
Education Network of Ontario

The Charter Challenge engaged approximately 500 students in teams of four to six to develop an argument based on a problem relevant to the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms. After exchanging ideas with other students and experts via computer accounts courtesy of the Education Network of Ontario, two arguments were selected by a panel of constitutional and civil rights experts and posted on the Charter Challenge Web site. Students were given the opportunity to ask questions of a panel of judges, and receive feedback through a live Web-cast. This project gave students who have studied the Charter an opportunity to apply their knowledge in a practical setting.

Immigrant and second-generation youth and the 20^th anniversary of the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms
The Sudbury Multicultural/Folk Art Association

The Sudbury Multicultural/Folk Art Association held three activities to celebrate the 20^th anniversary of the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms, including a panel lecture at Laurentian University, a poster competition, and a one-day conference and workshop. The activities asked about the importance of the Charter in the lives of immigrants and members of ethnic communities in Sudbury and its surrounding areas. Immigrants and second-generation youth were the desired audience, and the objective was to discuss and raise awareness of how the Charter affects their lives in particular.

" We are the children of the world, and despite our different backgrounds, we share a common reality. We are united by our struggle to make the world a better place for all. You call us the future, but we are also the present." - A World Fit for Us, May 8, 2002