The Children and Young People’s Commissioner, Bruce Adamson has taken a lead roll in engaging young people as part of the Northern Alliance’s Promoting Equity Week by leading two workshop sessions on children’s human rights. 

Primary as well as Secondary age students were able to join in two live online hour-long sessions outlining why now, more than ever, it is important that adults and children and young people know about their rights. Article 42 of the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child says that everyone should know about the UNCRC. People should think about ways to make sure everyone knows about the Convention, regardless of their age. There should be training around how to do this, especially for adults who work with children and young people.

Pupils from 16 schools across the Northern Alliance signed up to take part in the Commissioner’s workshops, sharing some of their experiences over this year with Bruce. One of their ideas was to use celebrity endorsements to help promote children’s rights.

Education specialists from across the eight northernmost local authorities as well as Education Scotland are delivering a week-long series of digital professional learning events for teachers and practitioners – as well as young people – as part of Promoting Equity Week (28 September – 2 October). This is part of a drive to increase awareness about child poverty in Scotland and the impact this has on learning. 

The aim is to help schools across the region consider the barriers faced by young people living in poverty and investigate the pressures the pandemic has had on vulnerable and disadvantaged children. Teachers and practitioners are taking the opportunity to look at mitigating measures they can use in school, explore how they can best use Attainment Scotland funding and share ideas and best practice with peers on how to address the poverty-related attainment gap. Lead officer Scott Calder explains: “At this time of pandemic, achieving equity for all our young people has never been more important or more challenging. Promoting Equity Week provides an important opportunity to collaborate on what is working, share research and provide professional learning opportunities which will support the work of educators across the Northern Alliance.”

Find out more on a dedicated Promoting Equity Week website: https://sites.google.com/as.glow.scot/promotingequityweek/home

You may also wish to follow the discussion on Twitter using the hashtag #NA2020Equity or by following @NAPovertyGap