Learn Without Fear: Campaign Progress Report

This report details some of the results which have been achieved since the global launch of Plan International's Learn Without Fear campaign in October 2008. Running in 44 countries, Learn Without Fear is a campaign to end violence against children in schools, with a particular focus on sexual violence, bullying, and corporal punishment. The report, which includes figures from a May-July 2010 survey, demonstrates how Plan is taking steps to stop violence in schools and shows that progress is already being made - from legislative changes to approaches such as positive discipline training for teachers and use of social media to reach out to communities.

According to Plan, children have been involved in all the aspects of the campaign - from planning workshops to raising awareness activities. Highlights of active child participation include the following:

• In Liberia, representatives of the Children's Parliament met with various government representatives to promote the development of the Children's Act, which subsequently passed.
• In Bolivia, 190 boys and girls participated in a debate about violence in schools at the National Assembly organised by Plan.
• Children from Ghana shared their experiences and called for global action to eliminate violence in schools at the UN [United Nations] session on Violence against Children in 2009.
• In Colombia and Bangladesh, young people are using theatre to tell stories about violence in schools.
• In Ecuador, 6 schools now have their own radio shows to talk about child rights and sexual and reproductive health.
• In both Rwanda and Burkina Faso, children are writing about Learning Without Fear for their local papers to convey the reality of violence in schools and communicate what the campaign is doing to address their concerns.
• In Mali, children are using new media methods. In each council, 20 children have received training in online communications as a way to voice their experiences and to call for action around violence in schools.
• In Ethiopia, children used the Great Ethiopian Run to raise awareness of the campaign by securing the ambassadorial role of the Olympic gold medal winner Paula Radcliffe to run in a campaign t-shirt. This helped the race organisers to promote the campaign, meaning hundreds of runners wore Learn Without Fear branded t–shirts. Collectively these efforts ensured a large amount of national media coverage.

Also, the report describes ways in which children who are part of the campaign are working in cross-country collaboration. The October 2009 Young Hearts festival, for example, brought together youth from Bangladesh, India, Indonesia, Philippines, Thailand, and Vietnam to raise their voices against violence in schools. Other contributors included arts and media personalities and the Prime Minister of Thailand. Their efforts helped produce films, television and radio programmes, musical performances, recordings, short stories, poems, theatre productions, comics, posters, and other visual arts pieces - all of which expressed youth perspectives and experiences of violence
in schools.

As detailed here, the campaign is working directly with families to educate them about children's rights and the negative impact that violent practices have on children. The strategy of reducing violence through training is also described; in Indonesia, for example, over 1,000 community leaders have been trained in child rights and child participation. Globally, nearly 600 journalists have received training on the issues related to violence in schools.

The strategy of collaboration is described here as effective. For instance, close and constructive working relationships and partnerships with teachers' unions and education authorities have been part of the campaign in an effort to enforce legislation protecting children from violence. In addition, many of the national campaigns are being undertaken in close partnership and collaboration with governments - for example the core campaign team in Nepal is made up of representatives from the Ministry of Education, Department of Education, the National Centre for Educational Development, the United Nations Children's Fund (UNICEF), Save the Children, and Plan.

Amongst the quantitative changes outlined in the report are the following:

"Changes in legislation

• Over 390 million children benefited from legislation protecting them from various forms of violence in schools
• Over 370 million children benefited from legislation protecting them from corporal punishment
• Over 20 million children benefited from legislation protecting them from sexual violence
• Over 6 million children benefited from legislation protecting them from bullying
• Plan is actively supporting the drafting and development of laws and policies against violence in a further 27 countries

...Changes in creating safer schools and communities

• 19,458 teachers have been trained in peaceful teaching methods
• 18,335 schools participated in supporting the campaign
• 108,915 family members received education on children's rights to protection from violence
• 36 countries are able to demonstrate how training and education on violence positively impact behaviour
• Plan is collaborating with teachers' unions to eliminate violence in schools in 19 countries

...Improved awareness

• 597,886 children participated in supporting the campaign
• Over 94 million people have been reached by campaign messages
• 22 countries report a reduction in girls' school dropout rates in targeted campaign areas
• 23 countries report a reduction in boys' school dropout rates in targeted campaign areas..."