November 20, 2022
With Participation of 15 Child Rights Organizations, PCHR Concludes Training Course on “Capacity Building for Community Organizations to Fulfill Child Rights”
With Participation of 15 Child Rights Organizations, PCHR Concludes Training Course on “Capacity Building for Community Organizations to Fulfill Child Rights”

 

Ref: 34 /2022

Date: 20  November 2022

 

On Thursday, 17 November 2022, the Palestinian Centre for Human Rights (PCHR) concluded a training course on “Capacity Building for Community Organizations to Fulfill Child Rights.” The training course was attended by 16 female and male participants representing 15 child rights organizations in the Gaza Strip. The 60-hour training course was held over the course of 3 weeks from 10 October 2022 to 17 November 2022.

This training program comes within PCHR’s project on “strengthening the role of CSOs,” which is funded by the Swedish International Development Cooperation Agency (Sida) in partnership with Save the Children and in coordination with community organizations.

This training aims to raise awareness among civil society organizations’ staff working with children on national and international conventions, especially the Convention on the Rights of the Child. The training also intends to impower CSOs to lead on data collection relevant to violations, accountability and defending children’s rights. Additionally, the training focuses on building trainees’ capacity on working with and influencing decision-makers at both the national and international levels, through standardized frameworks for enabling children rights and promoting inclusive and democratic CSO practices.

The training program was divided into three main components:

  1. Introductory training on the international human rights law; international conventions signed by the State of Palestine; mechanisms for monitoring and documenting human rights violations; violence against children and the national strategy to reduce it; empowering children in community participation, leadership, and accountability; and international and domestic protection for children.
  2. Theoretical and practical training on communication skills, i.e. speaking and dealing with children; debating and advocacy for child rights issues; and how to prepare, write and lead initiatives.
  3. United Nations human rights mechanisms; preparing and writing international reports strategies; how to prepare and write official international reports and shadow reports; submission and follow-up on individual complaints.

In conclusion of the course, PCHR organized a closing ceremony, where Mr. Raji Sourani, PCHR’s Director, emphasized that this training enhances cooperation and networking between PCHR and child rights organizations in the Gaza Stri[. He added, through this course, PCHR seeks to share knowledge and expertise with all participants, in order to build their capacities on child rights, advocacy issues, community involvement and the preparation of international reports to accomplish their tasks and achieve their goals efficiently and effectively. Furthermore, he called upon participants to transfer their knowledge to their institutions and relatives in order to create a community that supports the rights of Palestinian children.

Also, Sourani expressed his hope that the training course may contribute to improving the reality of child rights in Palestinian society, stressing that PCHR will continue to work with them and intensify efforts with partners to develop such programs in a way that contributes to building a generation of children fully aware and capable of defending their rights.

For their part, the trainees confirmed that the course was characterized with its rich topics that they were introduced to for the first time, praised the trainers’ efficiency and various interactive methods which focused on many important topics, especially how to prepare and write international reports pertaining to child rights, which will enable them to take part in the preparation of national and parallel reports.