An academy of children’s rights in Diyarbakır

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The Colorful Hopes (Rengarenk Umutlar) Association is a children's rights NGO based in Turkey's Kurdish-majority southeastern province of Diyarbakır. Founded by the Association, the Children's Rights Academy's first semester is about to start in Diyarbakır with a series of workshops.

Funded by Protect Defenders, the workshops to be held in this context will take place between November 1, 2020 and March 28, 2021. While the workshops will last 15 days each, 10 different workshops will be planned. Speaking to bianet about the workshops, Alper Yalçın, the Coordinator of the academy, has shared the following information:

'A huge gap in the field of children's rights'

"The armed conflicts that erupted in Diyarbakır in 2015 and the closure of several organizations working in the field of children's rights by the Statutory Decrees issued after 2016 have led to huge gaps in this field.

"Yes, new organizations have been established in the meantime; however, there is now more to be done about children's rights.

"Because even though armed conflicts have come to an end, they have left behind a series of issues that need to be struggled against such as severe trauma, poverty, dropping out of school, unemployment and impunity.

"Apart from this, there are some grounds for discussion that need to be strengthened so that a common language and a common ground can be found in Diyarbakır in terms of children's rights.

"Therefore, in addition to being an area of collective learning for us, the academy will hopefully bring us together and be a ground that helps us to keep alive our hopes. We will also make efforts to ensure that it will be sustainable. We aim to enable participants and experts to be a part of the academy at the same time and to work together afterwards."

About the academy

In the first year of the academy, the content of the workshops will be prepared by national and local experts. In the next semesters, it is expected that the content of the workshops will be prepared without national experts and they will be prepared by the previous participants who want to teach in the academy. In other words, the academy's capacity of experts will be extended by incorporating its graduates.

The names of the workshops to be offered by the academy are as follows: Perception of Childhood; Historical Development of Childhood and the Convention on the Rights of the Child; Basic Principles of the Convention on the Rights of the Child I & II; Political Rights of Children; Monitoring, Documenting and Reporting Violations of Children's Rights; Struggle against Impunity and Tools for Advocacy; Protection of Children; Intervention in Times of Crisis; Physical and Spatial Boundaries, Culture of Consent, Communication without Violence.

* Click here for more detailed information and application (in Turkish)

(AÖ/SD)