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| Joyful children |
Background: Children
are always among the most vulnerable in an emergency. When lives are uprooted,
the systems working to keep children safe – in their homes, schools and
communities – may be undermined or damaged. Children have specific protection needs
that are not met by other humanitarian sectors. Child
protection in emergencies is defined specifically as the prevention of and
response to abuse, neglect, exploitation and violence against children during
and after disasters, conflicts and other crises. It involves interconnected
activities by a range of actors, whether national or community-based and/or by
humanitarian staff supporting local capacities. Society for Education, Village Action & improvement (SEVAI)
has a comprehensive child protection policy, specifically designed to give
children their rights and fulfill its vision and goal of a world where children
can live and be safe.
Child
rights:
All
children are born with fundamental rights such as Right to Survival – to life,
health, nutrition, name, nationality, Right to Development – to education,
care, leisure, recreation, cultural activities, Right to Protection – from
exploitation, abuse, neglect, Right to Participation – to expression,
information, thought, religion. Core principles of the Act in relation to child
protection are: The welfare and best interests of the child are paramount, The
preferred way of ensuring a child's welfare is through support of the child's
family, Intervention is not to exceed the level necessary to protect the child,
Family participation in planning and decision making for children, Children and
families have a right to information, Services are to be culturally appropriate,
Coordination, consultation and collaboration with families, other
professionals, agencies and the community and Accountability. SEVAI recognizes the importance of families to children and promote caring
attitudes and responses towards children among families and all sections of the
community so that the need for appropriate nurture and care and protection
(including protection of the child’s cultural identity) is understood, risks to
a child’s well-being are quickly identified and any necessary support,
protection or care is to be promptly provided.
Children at
Risk.
SEVAI
recognizes three types of abuse such as Sexual, Physical and Emotional. A child is considered to be at risk if there is a significant
chance they will suffer serious harm to their physical, psychological or
emotional well-being and they do not have proper protection. This risk may be
as a result of abuse, neglect or the inability of a parent to care for and
protect a child or to exercise supervision and control over the child. In
making an assessment about whether a child is at significant risk or has been
abused or neglected attention must be had not only to the current circumstances
of the child’s care but also to the history of the child’s care and the likely cumulative
effect on the child
of that history.
Run away children:
A large number of children run away each year and stay
with strangers just met, putting them at risk of violence, abuse and
exploitation. SEVAI
programme aims to focuses on identifying and supporting vulnerable children who
use the transport system to escape their problems and to reach them before
abusers can. We work closely with professionals, officials and the policymakers to ensure systems are
in place to protect and support vulnerable children.
Compliances with Government Acts
and norms
SEVAI adheres to Regulatory compliance pertaining to
child protection and fundamental rights such as laws, regulations, guidelines and
specifications relevant Child protection policy.
SEVAI comes into contact with children for safeguarding policies
and procedures to ensure that every child, regardless of their age, gender,
religion or ethnicity, can be protected from harm.SEVAI protects children from abuse, neglect, exploitation, and violence
in the target area. Children experience poverty differently than adults do
because of their vulnerability and lack of legal and economic status in
society. How children are doing, in all aspects of their lives, reflects the
overall health and development of the family, community and society they live
in. A thriving society values all children, especially the most vulnerable, and
upholds their human rights. Children
are especially vulnerable to shocks, trauma and poverty. The most important
figures in children’s lives – their parents and caregivers are often
disempowered, poor and illiterate, thus perpetuating the cycle of poverty.
Breaking this cycle of intergenerational poverty requires a fresh approach to Child
protection and development.
Key areas of Child protection of SEVAI:
·
SEVAI’s programs focus on the most vulnerable
children while aiming for the safety and well-being of all children. Working
with governments, Donors and local community partners, SEVAI strives to create
lasting change with improvements in services that protect children whether in a
natural disaster, conflict, or development setting.
·
SEVAI child protection program activities include
creating Child Friendly Spaces in emergencies, reunifying separated and
unaccompanied children with their families in emergencies, developing public
awareness campaigns against child trafficking, training programs for social
workers to provide supportive care to families and children and advocating for
more effective national protection policies and child welfare reform.
·
SEVAI Works with parents to help raise awareness
about the importance to emergency preparedness and child protection. An
important part of all of SEVAI's child protection work, however, is the
participation and leadership of the children themselves. To this end, we
actively support child clubs and other child-led activities that educate
children on how to protect themselves, and empower them to call for action in
their communities.
·
SEVAI child protection policy provides a framework
of principles, standards and guidelines on which to base individual and
organizational practice in relation to such areas as: Recognizing and
Responding to abuse, Safe recruitment of staff, Training, Responsibility
and Accountability effective communication and working with other agencies,
appropriate behavior and attitude.
·
Sphere standards will be followed to enable SEVAI team
to access the information required quickly and easily to facilitate positive
action in the protection of children through the development Child Protection
Policy, highlighting the areas that need covering and providing statements.
·
Additional policy statements will need to be
included to ensure that the policy is comprehensive. SEVAI is to help identify
what additional policy statements will need to be developed to suit the
individual.
·
SEVAI schools are significant
personal and social environment in the lives of its students. A child-friendly
school ensures every child an environment that is physically safe, emotionally
secure and psychologically enabling. Teachers are the single most important
factor in creating an effective and inclusive classroom.
·
SEVAI has developed Schools that are characterized as
"inclusive, healthy and protective for all children, effective with
children, and involved with families and communities - and children”.
·
SEVAI Schools are significant personal and social
environment in the lives of its students. SEVAI child-friendly schools ensure
every child an environment that is physically safe, emotionally secure and
psychologically enabling.
·
Teachers are the single most important factor in
creating an effective and inclusive classroom. Children are natural learners,
but this capacity to learn can be undermined and sometimes destroyed. A
child-friendly school recognizes, encourages and supports children's growing
capacities as learners by providing a school culture, teaching behaviours and
curriculum content that are focused on learning and the learner.
·
The ability of a school to be and to call itself
child-friendly is directly linked to the support, participation and
collaboration it receives from families.
·
SEVAI .Child-friendly schools aim to develop a learning
environment in which children are motivated and able to learn. Staff members
are friendly and welcoming to children and attend to all their health and
safety needs.
·
We,
at SEVAI, have a comprehensive child protection policy, specifically designed
to give children their rights and fulfill our vision and goal of a world where
children can live and be safe. Keeping children safe is
everyone’s responsibility.
·
A fundamental
responsibility of SEVAI is to safeguard Children and SEVAI follows successfully
requires a firm commitment from school leaders and all other school
stakeholders. The school environment is unique, so knowing and understanding
specific threats and hazards is the first step to a comprehensive student
protection program.
SEVAI Schools Children protection:
Key components include:
1. Robust physical security (i.e. fences, gates
and locks.)
2. Access control policies and procedures (who is
allowed unsupervised access to students?)
3. Vigorous pre-employment screening for all
personnel who have unsupervised access to students. This includes not just
teachers and administrators, but also contractors, service personnel, and
temporary and volunteer staff.
4. Social/Emotional Curriculum where students
learn about predatory behavior and how to speak up with confidence against
harm. These topics should be taught in order to offer students the best defense
of all: knowledge.
5. Training for teachers and staff so they can
recognize offender traits and behaviors, as well as signs of at-risk children
and the appropriate actions to take.
Even though SEVAI schools may have a proactive child
protection program they should also be prepared to handle allegations of abuse,
should they arise. Establishing and maintaining policies and procedures for
reporting suspicions and anomalies regarding inappropriate or unsuitable
behavior will also be required. These include a prompt response, investigation
and the archived documentation of incidents and reports. Initiating and
maintaining a relationship with the responsible local authorities before an
incident is also critically important.
In order to be prepared, these policies and
procedures must be widely known and well-rehearsed. SEVAI and
professionals who work with children are required to ensure that their policies
and practices reflect this responsibility. Child protection policy provides guidelines for organizations
and their staff to create safe environments for children. It is a tool that
protects both children and staff by clearly defining what action is required in
order to keep children safe, and ensuring a consistency of behavior so that all
staff follow the same process.
A child protection policy also
demonstrates SEVAI’s commitment to children and ensures public
confidence in its safe practices.
SEVAI organization’s child protection policy:
·
Clearly
defined requirements to keep children and staff safe.
- Clear ways of
identifying concerns.
- Appropriate procedures
should a concern arise.
- Guidelines for reporting and
recording concerns.
- Recruitment guidelines
including screening and vetting procedures for both paid and unpaid staff.
- Safe working practices
and agreed staff behaviours.
- Child protection training
for all adults working with children.
·
A child protection policy provides a framework of
principles, standards and guidelines on which to base individual and
organisational practice in relation to such areas as:
• Recognising and Responding to abuse
• Safe recruitment of staff
• Training
• Responsibility and Accountability
• Guidelines for effective communication and working with
other agencies
• Guidelines for appropriate behaviour and attitude.
·
It provides a structure of
responsibility and identifies the action that staff should take if they have
concerns. It is a source of information that staff can refer to and be
reassured by - protecting both children and staff.
The child
protection policy also demonstrates SEVAI’s commitment to children and ensures
public confidence in its safe practices. While statistics indicate that the
closed walls of a domestic environment are most conducive for child sexual abuse,
institutional abuse is an entirely different arena as the two recent high-profile
cases. At least in schools and other institutions where children are engaged,
we can enforce guidelines to prevent the possibility of child sexual abuse. The
first step towards providing a safe environment for students would be for
schools to have a child protection policy.
Providing an environment conducive to
holistic growth of children into responsible adults was the underlying tone of
a consultative session on the ‘Role of Schools in Child Protection’
The role of schools in child
protection is crucial “because a great portion of the day is spent in schools.
There is a need for having at least one male and one female counselor in every
school.
‘Child
protection’ to refer to preventing and responding to violence, exploitation and
abuse against children – including commercial sexual exploitation, trafficking,
child labour and harmful traditional practices, such as child marriage. child
protection programmes also target children who are uniquely vulnerable to these
abuses, such as when living without parental care, in conflict with the law and
in armed conflict. Violations of the child’s right to protection take place in
every country and are massive, under-recognized and under-reported barriers to
child survival and development, in addition to being human rights violations.
Children
subjected to violence, exploitation, abuse and neglect are at risk of death,
poor physical and mental health, HIV/AIDS infection, educational problems,
displacement, homelessness, vagrancy and poor parenting skills later in life.
Preventing
and responding to violence, exploitation and abuse is essential to ensuring
children’s rights to survival, development and well-being. It is to create a protective environment, where
girls and boys are free from violence, exploitation, and unnecessary separation
from family; and where laws, services, behaviours and practices minimize
children’s vulnerability, address known risk factors, and strengthen children’s
own resilience. This approach is human rights-based, and emphasizes prevention
as well as the accountability of governments. This protective environment rests
in 2 strategic pillars: strengthening of national systems and social change,
which translate into the following 8 key strategies:
Attitudes,
traditions, customs, behaviour and practices: includes social norms and
traditions that condemn injurious practices and support those that are
protective.
Open discussion, including the engagement of media and civil society:
acknowledges silence as a major impediment to securing government commitment,
supporting positive practices and ensuring the involvement of children and
families.
Children’s life skills, knowledge and participation: includes children, both
girls and boys, as actors in their own protection through use of knowledge of
their protection rights and ways of avoiding and responding to risks. Capacity
of those in contact with the child: includes the knowledge, motivation and
support needed by families and by community members, teachers, health and
social workers and police, in order to protect children.
Basic and Targeted Services: includes the
basic social services, health and education to which children have the right,
without discrimination, and also specific services that help to prevent
violence and exploitation, and provide care, support and reintegration
assistance in situations of violence, abuse and separation. Monitoring and
oversight: includes effective systems of monitoring such as data collection,
and oversight of trends and The goal of the programme is to prevent violence
against children and to strengthen protection services for children in
vulnerable situations.
The government should work hard to a reduction of child labour by strengthening
child protection structures to adequately protect children against exploitation
and abuse, improving the quality of education to increase enrolment and
retention, raising awareness and empowering families and communities so that they
take collective action against child labour, and addressing exclusion of
vulnerable families to service provision and social protection schemes.
·
Child
victims of sexual abuse/exploitation
·
Child
victims of neglect or abuse
·
Child
victims of trafficking
·
Children
with disabilities
·
Children
in a situation of migration
·
Unaccompanied
children in a situation of migration
·
Children
without parental care/in alternative care
·
Children
in police custody or detention
·
Street
children
·
Children
of parents in prison or custody
·
Children
in judicial proceedings
·
Children
in or at risk of poverty
·
Missing
children (e.g. runaways, abducted children, unaccompanied children going
missing)
·
Children
affected by custody disputes, including parental child abduction
·
Children
left behind (by parents who move to another EU country for work)
·
Child
victims of female genital mutilation or forced marriage
·
Children
who are not in compulsory education or training or working children below the
legal age for work.
Executive
summary of SEVAI’s Child protection policy:
Strengthening child protection
systems is one of the most effective ways to build resilience and promote
sustainable development. Experience shows that when children are protected in
an effective and holistic manner, other humanitarian efforts are more successful.
It is important to raise awareness on child protection concerns targeting
beneficiaries, the wider population, parents, and communities Promote behavioral
change and implement activities to develop life skills for children and their
families and promotion of Activities to build resilience and enable better
prevention and response to child protection concerns. It is important that
SEVAIO provides structured social activities for children, facilitated by
adults from their own community. This may include child friendly spaces and
other psychosocial support activities. Child friendly spaces are environments
in which children can access free and structured play, recreation, leisure and
learning activities. Other psychosocial support activities that child
protection actors may deliver, in collaboration with the wider humanitarian
community, include mass communication about positive coping methods, the activation
of social networks and psychological first aid.
