CSO Alternate report on the CRC-FIJI

Hello girls and boys all over the world. This book is for you. If you are a grown-up you can also read this book. It is about violence against children. Violence is when someone hurts you and makes you feel bad on purpose. If you are being hurt, or know someone who is being hurt, this book will help you.

Your right to participate starts from the moment you are born – the moment you start to participate in life! It is about people (adults, children, decision makers, parents, everyone!) understanding that your voice, opinions, feelings, needs and rights are important and matter.

This guide has been designed to help Save the Children staff and colleagues from other organisations to run training workshops that will enable them to carry out advocacy. It consists of a Participant’s Manual and a Facilitator’s Manual that complement each other and are designed to be used together.

I have the right to be protected against all forms of discrimination and the responsibility not to discriminate against others.

Children’s right to be heard and to be taken seriously is a crucial and also visionary provision of the Convention on the Rights of the Child. It has helped to see childhood through a new lens and gain a renewed understanding of citizenship and democracy. Differently from before, children can no longer be perceived as passive recipients of care and protection, or accidental beneficiaries of policy decisions; they cannot be envisaged as not yet persons or adults in the making. As the international community commemorates the twentieth anniversary of the Convention and takes stock of the experience gained over the past several years of its implementation, children’s participation in decision-making stands as a critical dimension of this significant process of change.

What is this guide?
This guide is for Save the Children staff and partners who are involved in advocacy. You can use it to help you run an advocacy workshop, or as a general advocacy resource.The training material consists of a mixture of practical exercises and theory so that participants learn about advocacy in a way that is relevant to their specific needs and context, and they will come out of the workshop with a draft of an advocacy strategy. The guide consists of two complementary manuals: the Facilitator’s Manual and the Participant’s Manual that are designed to be used together.

• The Facilitator’s Manual is aimed at anyone who is designing or facilitating an advocacy workshop, including people who do not necessarily have much experience either as trainers or as advocates. Part One contains information on how to design, plan and run a workshop, with some tips on methodologies. Part Two contains individual session plans with detailed instructions on how to conduct each session.
• The Participant’s Manual contains background material on each topic, case stories,and references to further resources. It is intended to be a resource guide for both facilitators and participants.The Participant’s Manual can also be used on its own as a general advocacy resource.

Child-to-Child (CtC) is an approach to health promotion and community development that is led by children. It is based on the belief that children can be actively involved in their communities and in solving community problems. CtC projects involve children in activities that interest, challenge and empower them. In so doing, the approach “encourages and enables children to play an active and responsible role in the health and development of themselves, other children, their families and communities”