Eurochild gives Child Participation and Child Protection training to the European Network of Ombudspersons for Children (ENOC)
The content of the training was inspired by largely by current and former Eurochild Children’s Council members.
As part of Eurochild’s continuous capacity building efforts and due to our experience and expertise in the meaningful involvement of children in our work, on February 22, Mieke Schuurman, Director of Child Rights and Capacity Building, was invited to give a child participation and child protection training to the European Network for Ombudspersons for Children.
This training was delivered in the context of their European Network of Young Advisors (ENYA) project. ENYA was launched in 2010, with the support of the European Commission as a child and young people participatory project with the aim to actively involve children and young people in ENOC’s work.
This training, in particular, took place as part of ENOC’s 2023 activities kick-off and ahead of their Spring Seminar in Stockholm on the issue of ‘The role of National Human Rights Institutions in the Protection and Promotion of the Rights of the Child’.
Mieke shared Eurochild’s expertise, best practices and resources in an interactive training session with presentation methods that were either inspired by or thought of, largely, by current and former Eurochild Children’s Council members. She introduced the concept and foundations of child participation as well as its importance and how organizations can work with children in a meaningful and safe way.
More specifically, Mieke introduced the nine principles for meaningful, safe and inclusive children’s participation, which are based on the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child. She then presented core issues of child protection and safeguarding in an organizational context, including the importance of introducing and implementing a Child Protection Policy and Code of Conpartduct as well as proper risk assessment, mitigation and reporting.
We at Eurochild base our work on the principle that children are experts in their own lives and that It is essential that they participate in decisions that affect them. Eurochild wants to lead by example and is committed to supporting the direct involvement of children and young people in our work as well as support others, including the European Commission, the Council of Europe, and now the European Network for Ombudsmen for Children to engage directly and safely with children.
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