Ysgol Maes y Dderwen
This month Rocio and two members of the team visited Ysgol Maes y Dderwen’s Equality and Inclusion Group to hear the voices of young people about equality issues facing them in their daily life. They discussed the challenges of living in a rural area, and the dangers and worries they have around vaping and peer pressure to use vapes. Our team ran a workshop that included rights based activities with a focus on equalities issues. Thank you for sharing both positive and negative lived experiences with our team.
Hywel Dda Health Board
On World Mental Health Day this month it was a pleasure to visit Wales’ first mental health sanctuary for Young People. It was an informative visit to hear about an incredibly important service offering 24/7 support for young people in need of urgent support. It was great to see this being created following our calls for such a service in our No Wrong Door Report.
Online Ambassador Events
Our Ambassador Events are a great way to bring schools together to learn more about Children’s Rights and how our Office works to promote and protect them. This autumn we held several online sessions for our Super and Student Ambassadors where they had the opportunity to hear back about our Ambitions for Wales survey findings and an opportunity to ask Rocio their questions about our work. Thank you to all the schools that attended.
Ringland Primary School
We were invited to Ringland Primary School as they had been learning about refugees. Our team led a session on Article 22 of the UNCRC by reading a book following the theme and exploring the artwork to discuss how they think the characters would feel and what they think would happen next. It was brilliant to work with an engaged group of learners who had several thoughtful questions about our work promoting and protecting children’s rights in Wales.
Cwm Clydach Primary
Recently we have been working on new ways to engage with Children and Young People about their rights. Recently we led a hot topic session on Mental Health and Emotional Wellbeing with learners from Years 4,5 and 6 at Cwm Clydach Primary. It was interesting to hear from children about what they believe supports them best and they shared how they define mental health and emotional wellbeing. We had a great visit and it was lovely to see a group of children who understood the importance of pupil voice.
Cwm Taf Morgannwg Health Board
This month it was fantastic to engage with professionals from health, education and social care in the Cwm Taf Morgannwg Health Board’s Early Transformation Programme Conference: the power of healthy parent infant relationships to change lives. Our role in this conference was to discuss about the importance of children’s rights and how it can support optimal development for early years. For instance, safety, which links up to Article 19 of the UNCRC.
Mental Health and Emotional Wellbeing Focus Events
At the end of the month we visited Blaenau Gwent and Ynys Môn to hear about mental health an emotional well-being. It was great to hear from children and young people from both primary and secondary school age about what during the school day helps them with their wellbeing. In Blaenau Gwent we were hosted by Ebbw Fawr Learning Community and looked at what worked well and what could be better in our learning environments regarding wellbeing. We hosted our event in Ynys Môn in Beaumaris with Ysgol David Hughes and their cluster primary schools. It was fantastic to hear valuable contributions from a range of ages.
Visits and engagement work like this are valuable as they allow the views of children and young people to feed into how our Policy Team’s work.
