Street children support project

The project, which will be implemented through Guatemala"s Office of the Human Rights Ombudsman (OHRO), Casa Alianza (a local PVO), and an umbrella PVO, will have three components: public awareness/policy development; innovative services; and research and training. The project will be monitored by Technical Advisory Group of international children"s rights experts. Under the first component, OHRO will (1) design and pretest a mass media campaign to educate the public about children"s rights, particularly of girls living on the streets (the project will not finance actual publication or broadcasting); (2) support outreach and training efforts by community promoters in Guatemala City for hard-to-reach populations (e.g., street children, their families) and those who come in contact with them (e.g., police, businessowners); and (3) include child advocacy in ongoing OHRO human rights education programs. OHRO will also train governmental and nongovernmental organizations in the implementation and implications of Guatemala"s new Code for the Protection of Children (expected to become law early in the life of the project), and support formation of national and local councils on children"s rights. Finally, this component will strengthen OHRO"s overall institutional capacity to provide public education, report and refer cases of child abuses, and function as an advocate for children"s rights. The innovative services component will support PVO efforts on behalf of children living in the streets, children working in the streets, and abused children, with a focus on Guatemala City. Casa Alianza will receive support for programs in children"s advocacy, family reintegration, the special concerns of girls, and the securing of documentation (e.g., birth certificates) which street children need to enroll in school or pursue employment in the formal sector. An umbrella PVO will award subgrants to other PVOs for innovative child advocacy projects such as peer education, employer/employee counseling, and assistance to families of children at risk. In the final component, the umbrella PVO will manage a research and training program to improve the quality and completeness of data on children in need, investigate alternative service delivery approaches, and train project implementing institutions in project management skills. Subgrants will be made to PVOs, institutions, and private firms for research on the number of children living and working in the streets and abused children, factors that lead children to abandon child protective programs and return to the streets, and the characteristics of successful service delivery. Training will include courses and workshops to disseminate research results, third-country training and study tours to innovative service programs in other countries, and technical training in areas such as educational methodology, vocational counseling and job placement, family support services, advocacy, health education, and, in particular, the needs of adolescent women.