APPENDIX III: THE TRIPLE A CHILD RIGHTS AND COMMUNITY DEVELOPMENTAL PROCESS

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1 APPENDIX III: THE TRIPLE A CHILD RIGHTS AND COMMUNITY DEVELOPMENTAL PROCESS Background The Triple A Child Rights and Community Development Process is an approach developed by the International Institute for Child Rights and Development (IICRD), University of Victoria, Canada. Originally used by UNICEF s as a Triple A rapid assessment, analysis, action tool, it has been adapted to incorporate a strong focus on strategic, rights based systems change linking children, communities and governments that breaths life into the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child (CRC). Since it s adaptation in 1994, it has since been used within diverse cultures, countries and contexts to: Monitor and strengthen local, provincial and national child protection systems Develop the capacity of local governance in rights based approaches to working with vulnerable communities Reinforce child and youth engagement in local decision making Rebuild communities after natural disasters Create responsive systems of support for refugee and war affected children, and Develop culturally grounded, child and family services in Indigenous and ethnic minority communities IICRD s Developmental Child Rights Approach The Triple A Child Rights and Community Development Process is a set of tools rooted in IICRD s Developmental Child Rights Approach - a bottom up - top down systems change strategy to create positive, sustainable change in children s lives. This approach focuses on mapping assets, opportunities and capacities for dignity, belonging and justice within a child s social ecology, as well as identifying rights gaps in accountability to these determinants of children s life, survival and development. Using the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child (CRC) as a framework, the Developmental Child Rights Approach builds on the strengths and capacities of children, their communities, and culture to help contextualize the reality of children, and create sustainable interventions that bridge the gap between children s lived experiences and systemic structures and government policies. The complexities of these influencing factors on children s lives are brought to life in IICRD s Child Rights Ecology:

2 The Child Rights Ecology recognizes the many integrated and contextualized factors that contribute to the realization or lack of realization of the rights of each child by placing the child at the centre of a series of circles representing the factors and systems that influence, and are influenced by, the holistic development of the child: Children s inner world (emotional, spiritual, cognitive) Children s outer world (physical, social, behavioral) Other children and youth Family Community, natural and built environment Civil society, government and non-governmental Cultural, social, economic, civil and political Similarly, the Child Rights Ecology demonstrates how the child contributes to his/her social reality, while simultaneously being affected and served by it, highlighting the interconnectedness of child development and societal well-being. By connecting the Triple A Child Rights and Community Development Process to the Child Rights Ecology, IICRD s helps organizations and communities focus on filling the gaps, and build and further strengthen the bridges across and within the systems of children s lives to create long term change within these systems. Some of the key components organizations and communities are able to address through this process include: From the Bottom Up Assessing, and integrating children s views and lived experience at the centre of all actions for change Mapping local relations, risks and resilience for and with children From the Top Down Assessing and analyzing legal and policy accountability frameworks in terms of rights gaps and rights bridges Developing programs to build the capacity of rights holders to claim their rights and duty bearers to meet their responsibilities Identifying and strengthening supports for Addressing structural inequalities children Reinforcing child supporting cultural values, Monitoring systems for child rights

3 spiritual beliefs and practices applied to children s full and healthy development. Creating negotiated social space between government and children and their communities Throughout the application of the Developmental Child Rights Approach through IICRD s tools (including the Triple A Child Rights and Community Development Process) a strong emphasis is placed on the strengths of children, youth, their communities and their cultural contexts to ensure that all systems change strategies (policies, practices and attitudes) build on assets and are contextualized within the lived realities of the children. Unlike other approaches, experience and research has shown that the Developmental Child Rights Approach: Emphasizes the importance of capabilities and opportunities as foundations for peoples full and healthy development rather than a more narrowly defined economic definition; Builds on assets or strength based models of community development (Kertzman & McKnight, 1993) and youth development (Dryfoos, 1990), emphasizing the inner resources of young people as important starting places to address risk; Emphasizes the investment in young people s assets and protective factors rather than focusing solely on specific problems; Sheds light on the context of children s lives, emphasizing the importance of connectedness, achievement, participation, and strategic partnership as effective strategies for overcoming challenges to children and youth (Rajani, 2001); Mobilizes local assets and protective mechanisms to create an enabling environment for children s survival, development, protection and participation (Cook, Blanchet- Cohen, Hart, 2004); and Combines the best of rights based accountability with individual and community development strategies (Cook, 2007). In short, a Developmental Child Rights Approach is effective because it helps organizations and communities to further: Implement the human rights of children in context ; Identify and support the most vulnerable children; Understand children s different needs and potentials (e.g. through the meaningful participation of children); Understand and support the decision-making role of children in communities, programming and policy making; Ensure all children are a priority; Inform policies and legislation, and

4 Justify requests for resources and support from donors, governments and NGOs. The Triple A The Triple A Child Rights and Community Development Process Uses a child-centred approach that brings communities together to create a vision for children and families and develop tangible action plan to breathe life into that vision; Builds on a holistic community participation process that identifies local risks for children and strengthens local child and family supports; Engages key individuals, including children and youth in designing programs and services that reduce risk and strengthen protection through community development; Engages children, communities and government in rights based discussions and actions with systems wide accountability and local development; and Involves children and youth meaningfully in this process. In seeking to create sustainable systems change in support of children s human rights, IICRD has been working to develop the capacity of human service professions (governmental and non-governmental) on the key principles of children s rights, child development, child and youth participation, protection, psychosocial rehabilitation within a culturally-grounded rights framework, and provide them with the tools to engage children, youth and their communities in programming and policy development. The Triple A Child Rights and Community Development Process is a tried and tested, strategic process and set of tools that we have used to achieve these goals. A key component of the Triple A that differentiates it from other child rights or community development approaches is its capacity to create a negotiated social space between children, their communities, and various levels of governance (local, provincial and national) to create timebound, measurable actions supporting children s rights to their full and healthy development. The benefits to children and their families are the creation of rights based solutions to local rights challenges based on their own identification of rights gaps, and local assets that incorporates child and youth active involvement as change agents. It also assists local child focused practitioners, and government and non-governmental agencies in better responding to children s issues that support their inherent human rights. This Triple A Child Rights and Community Development Process is a step by step, strategic process in which IICRD staff works with a local organization to train local Triple A facilitators and a program manager, who in turn work with local stakeholders (including children and youth) to develop tangible action plans, monitoring systems, advocacy networks, and trained cohorts of engaged children, youth, and key local children s advocates. Capacity development for local staff focuses on the bottom-up component of the Developmental Child Rights Approach in relation to a country s child rights laws and policies. This assists staff to better understand and contextualize the situation of children, youth and their communities and enhances the effectiveness of their programming in relation to the local child rights environment.

5 The experiential trainings cover: Child rights and child development Strength-based approaches to working with young people Local mapping of rights gaps and developmental assets; Rights-based experiential activities with young people (walking tours, mapping, photo framing, role playing, focus groups); Semi-structured interviews with local child advocates; Guided rights-based discussions with children, local care providers and community leaders that analyze problems, and root causes of problems; Creating of local action plans that apply the principles of the CRC and link children, key community members and governments to fill rights gaps and strengthen child centred assets, and Creating sustainable, local monitoring systems linking children, communities and government In addition to these onsite trainings, IICRD provides ongoing support to the local organizational staff and program manager who oversees and coordinates the process and activities with the young people, their families and communities, and government community facilitators.. The Process The Triple A Child Rights and Community Development Process is initiated with an invited site visit or pre-assessment, and commitment by a local organization (s) not only to engage in the process, but to provide ongoing support for the resulting child-led action plans. Once this is secured, the training and 3 step Triple A Process is initiated. The 3 steps of the Triple A process include: 1. Assessment. The first step of the process is an assessment of the community s capacity to support children and youth, whereby young people, their care providers, families, Elders, community members and local officials identify the strengths and weaknesses that exist for young people. Children s views are collected first and presented to the larger community to spur discussion and collect further information. Elder involvement ensures a strong focus on building on cultural strengths and traditions, while local official/community leader involvement ensures that the players who have the authority to make changes to policies and services are part of the process. Triple A Assessment: Indigenous youth in Western Canada map community risks and strengths to inform the transformation of child protection services 2. Analysis. The second step, analysis, engages children, youth, their families and the broader community in a collective process to critically analyze the data (the child-focused strengths, challenges and needs) collected from the assessment.

6 Triple A Analysis: Youth in Victoria, Canada, conduct a photo framing analysis of municipal civic engagement strengths and challenges 3. Action. In the third step, action, children, youth, their families, community based service providers, local officials and Elders develop child-centered action plans that utilize and build on local strengths to address their primary areas of concern. As a result, young people, their families and the community determine the results of the process and benefit from participating in the design, development and implementation of actions to meet their specific needs. The actions (i.e. community projects, training, monitoring and advocacy) are bottom-up projects that are culturally grounded and participatory. Each action is carried out by different community stakeholders (E.g. Children typically have their own distinct actions that tie into the larger community actions) and supported by the lead organization, ideally in cooperation with other local or regional organizations. Triple A Action: Children in Blugumbosch, South Africa, participate in developing community gardens supporting orphans and other vulnerable children

7 The Tools Specific assessment tools are selected from a broad range of interventions, to ensure age, cultural and contextual suitability, for example: Walking tours Social mapping Photo framing Focus group discussions Creative visualization processes Elder discussions Individual interviews with local child advocates Problem tree analysis Root cause analysis Action mapping The Results Different types of child-led and child-centered actions that commonly result from the Triple A process include: Capacity building: e.g. Training local government practitioners to support child rights in the context of community development. Service delivery: e.g. Creating action focused partnerships linking children, government and civil society Advocacy: e.g. Children and local advocates strategize on their right to access to services.

8 Monitoring: e.g. Young people form a committee and work closely with organizations to provide feedback and suggestions on their youth programming. Community Results have included: A cohort of government and/or non-government staff and facilitators trained in the Triple A. Key areas identified as priorities for the lead organization. Triple A process carried out with local children and youth. Psychosocial healing and recovery of young people on a holistic level. Young people and community actively engaged in community development process. The development of local child rights steering committees supporting sustainable child rights programming. Increased cohesion, collaboration and child-centred peace building at the community level. Youth-led Action Plans implemented to address needs identified by young people themselves. Youth Committees formed with viable connections to youth networks, community groups, government and agencies. Well-being indicators developed with children, youth and families for a contextualized monitoring and evaluation Process. Evaluation of project impact. Conclusion Children, women, youth, elders, local and international NGOs, service providers, community leaders and government officials are engaged in every stage of the IICRD s Triple A Youth and Community Development Process that uses a Developmental Child Rights Approach. As a result, community actions tend to address the primary needs of the children that build on existing strengths and utilize culturally appropriate methodologies. The process also creates linkages between child and community actions to the local government that has the potential to influence policies and practices on a much larger scale. While it is important to note, that this process should not be undertaken lightly as it labour intensive and requires a long term commitment, the empowerment of the young people and their communities and the sustainability of results are unparalleled.

9 Contact Information For more information on the Triple A process or to receive specific information on Triple A reports or other IICRD material please contact: Dr. Philip Cook pcook@uvic.ca or Vanessa Currie vciicrd@uvic.ca Tel. (250) Mailing address: IICRD Centre for Global Studies University of Victoria Victoria, BC Canada V0N 2M2