Human Rights Education Club

Project Duration

December 2022 – May 2023

Donor / Partner

Location

Dhaka district

Target Group

Total Beneficiary

20 youths

Rationale

Denial of an individual’s basic human rights is equivalent to denying him the right to exist in a civilized world. It hinders individuals’ creative potential and, by extension, their ability to contribute to nation-building initiatives. Providing proper human rights education can play a significant role in empowering and encouraging young people across the country to become active citizens of their communities.

In a country like Bangladesh, violations of human rights at all levels necessitate human rights education for all ages and sectors of people. Understanding the importance of human rights in practice is crucial to protecting individuals from abuse of public power and giving effect to their rights. For these aims to be achieved, it is vital that the public is aware of and understands what their human rights are. In spite of this, human rights education rarely forms part of the discussion, presenting a missed opportunity to inform citizens of their rights from an early age and, thus, increase the effectiveness of human rights for all.

Human rights education aims to create an effort to build a universal culture of human rights through imparting knowledge and skills as well as shaping attitudes. The goals of this include strengthening respect for human rights and fundamental freedoms; promoting understanding, tolerance, gender equality, and friendship among all nations, indigenous peoples, and racial, national, ethnic, religious, and linguistic groups; and enabling everyone to participate effectively in a free society. Human rights education generally possesses a transformative effect that leads to positive changes in families, institutions, and job sectors. The Universal Declaration of Human Rights encompasses various facets of human rights from articles 1 to 30. It is the responsibility of human rights educators to inform the people of each of these aspects. There are growing debates that human rights education can contribute to decreasing human rights violations and help create a society that is free, just, and peaceful.

Goal

To empower the youths on human rights education and create opportunities for community services.

Objective

A human rights education club has been formed consisting of 20 young people
20 young people have been capacitated with human rights education and active citizenship roles
Youths have been working on community action projects and promoting human rights education in their respective communities

Activity Details

Activity 1: Call for action

An open call for action was be disseminated through the social media platforms of the JAAGO Foundation & Volunteer for Bangladesh including Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, Linkedin, and other social media in order to encourage the youths to participate in the human rights club and to grow and advance the existing club. The current members of the club and other members were recruited through the call for action. Inclusive participation of all communities including the marginalized or excluded community was ensured.

Activity 2: Recruitment and Selection of the youths

The youth applicants were shortlisted and selected based on a set of criteria. Through the call for action, a total of 20 youths had been recruited to join the human rights club and joined the capacity-building training. The selected age group of the participants is between 18 to 35 years.

Activity 3: Capacity building training

A two-day non-residential capacity-building training (from 9AM – 5PM) was arranged in Dhaka for the recruited youths of the human rights club. The participants acquired the information necessary to develop community action initiatives through participating in the capacity-building training. The training enlightened the youths about fundamental human rights, breaches and violations of those rights, and the ways through which the youths can play a crucial role in addressing the problems that exist in their communities. The learnings of the training include but are not limited to, identifying problems, designing, activity planning, making implementation strategies, monitoring, and evaluating the effectiveness of their community projects. This capacity-building training helped the youths to have a better understanding of the different components of a project which assisted them in their next phase while implementing their own community action projects. The youths were instructed to pair up and form a team of 2 to plan and design the community action projects

Activity 4: Call for Proposals

After the completion of the capacity-building training, the youths were instructed to identify significant human rights-related issues occurring in their communities and share their ideas for community action projects. 10 groups were formed, each consisting of 2 members. A call for proposals was disseminated to the youths through which they were able to submit the proposals for their projects. Each team submitted 1 proposal, totalling 10 community action projects. The submitted project proposals have then been evaluated and among them, the best 3 have been selected for implementation.

Activity 5: Selection of action projects and seed money distribution

All the submitted project proposals have been evaluated based on the ability to best identify the human rights challenges and design appropriate community action projects addressing the issues. Among the proposals, a total of the best 3 community action projects were provided with seed funds for the implementation phase of the project. The remaining members of the club have been allocated into these 3 projects depending on their preferences. Through this, all the members will gain an opportunity to engage and contribute to the community action projects. Seed money and necessary guidelines are being provided to each of the 3 projects for the proper implementation of the projects.

Activity 6: Virtual refresher training

Before initiating the action projects on ground, a day-long refresher training have been arranged virtually for all 20 youths of the human rights club. The refresher helped them revisit the values and components of human rights education and the community action project implementation strategies.

Activity 7: Community Action Project Implementation

The selected community action projects are being implemented for 2 months in their respective communities. The youths will be able to utilize their acquired knowledge from the capacity building training and have first-hand experience in project implementation. This initiative will help the youths to develop and refine their skills as well as contribute to the betterment of their communities.

Activity 8: Symposium

In a symposium organized by JAAGO Foundation, the 20 youth members of the Human Rights Education Club will share their knowledge and experiences. The youths will present their implemented project outcome and its impact on the community. It will be arranged in Dhaka with the youth members of the club along with the members of JAAGO Foundation. The representatives of Amnesty International will virtually attend the symposium. The youths, in presence of all the members of the human rights club and members of the JAAGO Foundation and Amnesty International, will put forward the details of their project, their achievement, goals, and the overall outcome of the project.