It is the seventh year that we have been working directly with children during our activities. Since it is only worth thinking about children together with children. We worked with our child volunteers, our Kid Colleagues, on several projects in 2023. The Kid Colleagues group is made up of young people aged between 13 and 17 years, who meet regularly in our office in Budapest or online and they work together on the Foundation’s projects and their own initiatives. Last year, we held more than 60 meetings and involved 20 children into different areas of our work.
In 2023 we worked with the children at different levels:
- Our Kid Colleagues cooperated with us closely. This year they participated in almost all activities of the Foundation.
- We worked with another three child volunteers on a project-by-project basis. (As the professional expert of the NEMECSEK Sport Programme, as the member of the editorial staff at the platform Telekom Hello Parent and one volunteer participated in the Child-friendly Media and Commercial project.)
Our main topics were the followings:
- choosing a group name
- consultancy and development of participation methods, children as human rights activists
- school and education
- bullying and abuse
- protection against violence
- child safeguarding policies
- safety of children in sports
- demonstrations
- social security
- online security
- sex education and sexual abuses against children
- projects, questionnaires initiated by international organisations
The children took part in the work of the Foundation in various roles and responsibilities: consultancy, content production, awareness-raising, giving opinions, participating in training sessions and executing independent initiatives. We also held several internal training sessions to help the children process and understand various topics and expand their knowledge. Taking their opinions into account, we created our professional and communication materials and supported the independent projects of the children, such as the video about their favourite child rights for International Children’s Rights Day. Moreover, our Kid Colleagues and child volunteers represented their own experience and the importance of child rights in several interviews, articles and at several conferences.
The Foundation’s projects in which the children participated:
- We also worked with our Kid Colleagues in the ECPAT projects: we talked about boundaries , they participated in a Facebook Live event on the topic of online safety and in a journalistic training. They helped the development of the strategy of ECPAT on child participation.
- By joining the NEMECSEK Programme they prepared posters for nurseries, participated in Facebook Live events regarding the topics of bullying and quality time, supported and shared their opinion on the development of the Child Safeguarding Policy, had a role in the preparation of a video course and in a teacher training.
- The children actively took part in the personal training sessions at Hintalovon Academy and the consultancy work on the case studies of e-learning training sessions.
- Every year since 2016, the Foundation has drafted a comprehensive annual report on events, changes in legislation and statistics that have relevance from a child rights perspective. The annual report of 2022, drafted and published in 2023, also included the thoughts and opinions of our Kid Colleagues.
- The children also participated in the planning and execution of content published on social media on numerous occasions.
The Kid Colleagues also took part in several collaborations, for example:
- They presented at the ‘Children in the cyberspace’ conference organised by the National Police Headquarters (ORFK), where they talked about online security and the habits of young people while surfing on the internet.
- One of our Kid Colleagues participated in the conference of the Child Rights NGO Coalition, where he/she spoke to other young volunteers of other organisations about their experiences and child participation.
- Two KiCos shared their experience on the topics of online security and integrated education at a community meeting in Budaörs.
- A KiCo reported on the child participation activities of the Foundation in an rtl.hu article.
- Our two child volunteers became members of the editorial staff of the Telekom Hello Parent platform.
- Our Kid Colleagues appeared in a Magenta podcast, in which they spoke about bullying and shared their thoughts about it.
Moreover, we worked together on international inquiries:
- One of our Kid Colleagues was member of the Eurochild Children’s Council,as a result he/she travelled twice to Brussels, where each month he/she worked together with 10 other children on different tasks of the organisation, including the preparation of a campaign for the European Parliamentary Elections in order to raise awareness of the importance of child rights.
- One of our Kid Colleagues spoke about the issues of social security at an online meeting
The independent projects of the children included:
- an introductory video about who the Kid Colleagues are and what they do at the Foundation
- a video about their favourite child rights, made on the occasion of International Children’s Rights Day
- creating communicational content that responds to current events, for example, our Mother’s Day and Teacher’s Day greeting posts were made with their help.
There were many changes in the team, several KiCos turned 18 and the team of mentors, the colleagues that worked more closely with them, has also been transformed. Last year, in the second semester, we created a new structure where, in addition to the shared meetings, the children worked together with the Foundation staff in four smaller groups:
- Hintalovon Academy
- NEMECSEK Programme
- Consultancy on child rights
- Communication
Aside from our mentors, children working with us can report to the NEMECSEK group responsible for our compliance with the Child Safeguarding Policy if they have grievances or concerns. In addition, during every project and meeting, children had the opportunity to give feedback and share their experiences, even anonymously. At the end of every semester, we put special emphasis on the joint and individual evaluation of the previous period, for which we used several methods.
Opinions of the children about the programmes and their favourite projects of the year
- Public appearances and training sessions appeared many times among their favourite projects, where they could directly represent their opinions and meet professionals. The most popular topics for them were those where they had their own experience: for example, the online world and education.
- What they liked about the independent initiatives was that they were present in all phases of the process: from the conception of the project up until its execution. They especially liked those projects in which everyone participated and worked as a team.
- Their feedback was that they would very much like to try out new types of tasks and involve themselves more deeply in a specific topic and participate in several trainings. Having heard this, in 2024 we will place greater emphasis on supporting independent initiatives and we will also invite experts in various topics to the meetings.
- Despite the many personnel and structural changes, we can say that the children’s group became stronger and the motivation was high. In order to improve communication difficulties and even workload, we created a new structure for 2024.
- All KiCos would like to participate in the recruitment process starting in the spring of 2024 and they are very excited to see new members join. The recruitment of new KiCos will start in June and all information will be available on our platforms.
The recruitment for the new KiCo-s starts in June, and all information will be available on our platforms
Our work with Kid Colleagues and children who work with us in further collaborations is governed by the Child Safeguarding Policy, which we revise annually.
Our aim with the 2023 report on the Child Participation Programme is to provide an overview on our shared work, to highlight the diverse possibilities of child participation and to contribute to the dissemination of good practices and the discussion of methodological dilemmas.
You can find the full version of our professional report here.
You can find the reports on the Child Participation Programme from previous years here: 2020, 2021, 2022.
You can find other useful content and articles on the issue of child participation here.
