UNICEF and World Scouting Partner To Make Young People’s Voices Heard
This year as a part of the annual JOTA-JOTI (Jamboree on the Air - Jamboree on the Internet), taking place on the 16th & 17th of October, WOSM will be partnering with UNICEF to develop a platform for young people to express their views. Capitalizing on the tremendous popularity of JOTA-JOTI, which gathers every year more than half a million participants, the goal is to question the youth of today about their motivations and desires.
In connection with International Year of Youth that was launched in August this year and the 20th anniversary of the signing of the Convention on the Rights of the Child celebrated in November 2009, this year’s theme for JOTA-JOTI is “ Right to be heard”.
Apart from traditional chatting on the Internet - JOTI or radio - JOTA this year Scouts will also use such new media tools as Facebook, Twitter, Youtube and Flickr as well as UNICEF’s Voices of Youth blog.Discover JOTA-JOTI 2010 Proposed Activities.
The Voices of Youth blog is a new platform created by UNICEF to report on issues which affect young people and adolescents globally. The blog is open to contributors from around the world and features articles and posts from children and adolescents, UNICEF staff and partners. Its objective is to report on global and local issues affecting young people, promote a global dialogue and the sharing of information as well as feature projects, events and ideas to enable meaningful interactions.
WOSM and UNICEF have been working together for a long time now and together have reached out millions of children and young people around the world, empowering them in issues related to youth participation, immunization/child survival and development, HIV/AIDS education, children in difficult circumstances, and promoting life skill based education.
This year’s theme for JOTA-JOTI is “Right to be heard” which is divided into such subthemes as youth rights, youth involvement, youth empowerment. This theme directly relates to UNICEF’s mandate.
Article 12 of the Convention on the Rights of the Child provides:
“1. States Parties shall assure to the child who is capable of forming his or her own views the right to express those views freely in all matters affecting the child, the views of the child being given due weight in accordance with the age and maturity of the child.
2. For this purpose the child shall in particular be provided the opportunity to be heard.
More information and useful links:
International Year of Youth : social.un.org/youthyear
20 Years of the Convention on the Rights of the Child : www.unicef.org/rightsite/
Convention on the Rights of the Child : www.unicef.org/crc/
Text of the convention : ohchr.org/english/crc.htm
Voices of Youth: www.unicef.org/voy
Voices of Youth blog: blog.voicesofyouth.org/
Voices of Youth Facebook: www.facebook.com/voicesofyouth
Voices of Youth Twitter: twitter.com/voices_of_youth
Voices of Youth YouTube: www.youtube.com/unicefvoy
Empowering Young Adults : scout.org/../empowering_young_adults
WSPU General Assembly : wspuga2010.org
Image 1: © Scout Association of Serbia / Ninoslav Jovic
