Council for the Welfare of Children partners with BSP, launches Children’s Day Camp for Scouts, OSYs and children with disabilities

MANILA, Philippines – In commemoration of the 2018 National Girl-Child Week Celebration, the Council for the Welfare of Children partnered with the Boy Scouts of the Philippines for a Children’s Day Camp at the BSP National Headquarters in Manila on March 19, 2018.

The camp gathered more than 60 children from diverse backgrounds – a handful of Senior Scouts from the Boy Scouts of the Philippines, children with learning disabilities, indigenous peoples, and street children or the out-of-school youth. The activities in the camp being facilitated by professional Scout leaders from the National Headquarters of the Boy Scouts of the Philippines, teaching the children basic skills in Scouting, including knot tying and lashing, first aid and bandaging, compass reading, fire safety, survival cooking and basic AR/CPR.

“The 2018 Girl Child Week is an activity not just for the girls, it is also an activity participated by boys. The CWC partnered with the Boy Scouts of the Philippines in order to teach the young people with life skills, or survival training by way of interactive sessions. This partnership with the BSP is very timely as they move towards making BSP more inclusive,” said Mary Mitzi Cajayon-Uy, Executive Director of the Council for the Welfare of Children.

The activity is a project of the Council for the Welfare of Children, a government inter-agency body tasked to monitor and evaluate the implementation of policies and programs for children and the enforcement of laws affecting child welfare. CWC is also the government agency that monitors the country’s compliance to the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child, which the Philippines ratified with the force of law in 1990.

In his welcome remarks, Arthur R. Sales, one of the directors at the BSP National Office, said, “I am glad that we are having this camp, gathering young people from different sectors of the society. This is in line with our thrust to make BSP more diverse and more inclusive to more young people.”

The Girl-Child Week, otherwise known as ‘The Protection and Gender-Fair Treatment of the Girl Child Week’ is celebrated annually every 3rd week of March to raise awareness among children, parents and the public that girls aged 18 years old and below should be given equal opportunity and protection.

The week-long celebration was organized as a response to the issues being faced by young girls, including issues on child exploitation, prostitution, sexual abuse, teenage pregnancy and HIV/AIDS.

The BSP is also set to host the very first Asia-Pacific Regional Workshop on Diversity and Inclusion this coming June 2018.