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"joya banerjee" [ Profil ] |
| Sujet: |
Summary Week 2
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| Envoyé: |
Mar 17th, 2008 - 15:40:03 |
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Thanks to Ahmed, Gio and Vladimir for their facilitation of Week 2 and
the summary of your responses! Thanks to the participants for your
responses. We are considering extending the consultation by one week
in order to continue our discussions. How do participants feel about
that?
This week we hope to turn your ideas into messages and strategies that
we can use for the advocacy and visibility campaign. We are already
thinking about the following possibilities:
- T-shirts for youth, posters, stickers, banners with the key messages
- postcards to hand out with the key messages on one side, and info
about the Youth-Adults Commitments Desk on the other (telling them to
come make a commitment)
- Stickers for people who have made commitments (for AIDS 2006 we did
"I commit to youth")
The T-shirts were particularly useful in sessions when we had tons of
young people asking questions during the Q&A, and bringing the
speakers back to the Commitments Desk afterward.
One more time here is the link to the materials we created for
AIDS2006: http://www.ghazalehdesign.com/aids2006.html
Remember that the key messages have to be short, precise, and
concrete. I look forward to hearing your suggestions!
Week 2 Summary
This is the 2nd Week Summary. It highlights the points that
participants responded with, in regards to the following questions.
4. What are some specific concerns that we can group under the issue
that came up in Week 1?
"Youth participation and Access to information" were the key words in
many respondents' point of view.
Some added Stigma and Vulnerability in relation to young people as
other key words and it was pointed out by Spanish participants as a
barrier to obtaining more support. Also increasing access into
information; where some discussed as a target and others thought of it
as a method to increase advocacy tools and decrease vulnerability.
There was a response focusing on Media, and youth media in particular,
as a powerful means of raising awareness as well as advocacy. It is
clear that answers to the next question would elaborate more on
priorities, tactics and methodologies to achieve effective, meaningful
participation by young people.
The need for a health system without discrimination was also
highlighted and the need of an education program for people living
with HIV. One of the suggestions was to
Other issues identified as problems were access to HIV prevention
information, condoms, and other services to drug users.
5. What are some ways that these concerns can be met and how can
governments and/or civil society address them?
Youth involvement on the levels of government and the civil society.
Among Spanish participants, "INTEGRATION" was described as the most
important thing to do. Integrate government, civil society (NGOs,
youth movements and community based organizations) and make alliances
to solidify efforts. Increase the amount of resources to work on
HIV-AIDS
• Importance of involvement of youth in policy- and decision-making
• Examples suggested by participants as measures should be taken by
the government
- They should directly involve the targeted and vulnerable groups.
- Including correct accurate messages in curricula of schools and colleges.
- Involvement of young people in decision making on the level of
government and civil society.
- Youth policies should be made at national level and Youth should be
involved in it (Youth can be reached through Schools, Colleges,
Universities, Youth Groups and Organizations, and the policies should
be design according to Youth needs and ideas)
- Change some laws in order to involve youth in the planning process,
and decision making for prevention strategy.
• Some suggested advocacy messages
- Establishment of co-ordination mechanisms between the government and
civil society
- Stressing media and providing facilities for youth media to raise
awareness, address more young people, and promote their needs.
- Fighting stigma and elimination of discrimination.
- Allocation of enough funds for HIV prevention programs
- Availability of medications and ARVs at the lowest cost.
"They should try as much as possible to make the medicine (ARVs) tax
free such that they can be in circulation for every infected person to
be in position to acquire the medicine. This is because the taxes put
on these drugs in my country – Uganda – are too high to the extent
that they are also sold at a high price there by making it impossible
for the poor people to get proper medication."
A respondent from USA gave an example of effective advocacy efforts of
young people: "When HIV/AIDS policies and programs are failing to
address the specific needs of youth, youth can play an active role in
holding their government accountable. For instance, in the United
States, youth have been applying pressure on lawmakers around the
reauthorization of the President's Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief
(PEPFAR)—the U.S. global AIDS initiative that provides prevention,
treatment, and care to millions of persons worldwide. PEPFAR in its
current form contains many ideologically-driven restrictions,
particularly on prevention funding, including a restriction that 1/3
of prevention fund spent on abstinence-until-marriage programs.
Young activists have pushed back on this harmful restriction by
targeting the U.S. Congress with a postcard campaign, emails, phone
calls, and sign-on letters to get lawmakers to remove this restriction
when PEPFAR is reauthorized this year"
Capacity building and providing skills for young people.
• Civil society organizations should work for capacity building of
Youth and should be involved in advocacy for meeting the above
concerns.
• Youth Capacity Building to advocate toadults nationally and internationally.
• Consider Peer education as one of the most effective ways to reach
young people and groups practicing high risk behaviors, and support
peer to peer education programs.
6. If you have been to an International AIDS Conference before, what
do you think we could do differently (in terms of advocacy) as the
YouthForce this time? If you haven't been before, what are some
examples of good or bad advocacy tactics from campaigns you know of
that could help us in developing our campaign?
All the Spanish participants said they haven´t participate in an IAC,
and pointed out some important thing to do in order to get and the job
done.
Empower young people, give them the abilities to design strategies to advocate.
Organize activities and materials to make youth participation more
visible at the IAC
• Make print materials, such as a newspaper, magazine etc, to
distribute it in the IAC.
One respondent identified the good tactic saying" the most important
thing to do is to create a clear, positive and powerful message for
the campaign and to find a good way to spread this message."
Also there are some comments that suggest using or discarding some
advocacy tactics.
- Magazines and flayers: Might be designed in order to create
attention, but as a large volume of flayers expected in IAC Mexico it
might not do the trick.
- Marches can be ineffective as many people don't see them
- Using sustainable campaigns materials like: T-shirts, stickers,
watches, as many months later, these materials will continue to have
their impact.
- Wearing T-shirts; increase the visibility as they could be used on a
large scale of events internationally and locally.
- We are not making of all the technology we have, such as internet,
mobile phones, TV, especially that our target groups are young people
who are more fascinated with new technology.
- To increase the for visibility particularly for the media, a
creative "hook" is essential, whether that be a theme, prop, slogan,
etc.
- Opportunities for action should span from entry-level to advanced
tactics (for instance, from reading a book or writing a letter to a
lawmaker to organizing a rally or press conference).
Also A quote from a respondent who attended IAC conference Toronto 2006:
"My experience at the IAS conference is limited the Toronto
Conference 2006 nonetheless at this time my main concern for improving
the advocacy at Mexico would be make youth participation more
meaningful. In addition to having a youth program there needs to be
more youth representation at the main forums and presentations that
recognizes the youth population and providing similar representation
with others on the larger discussions"
7. Please rank the following suggested topics for an advocacy
skills-building session from 1 to 5, with 1 being the most important
and 5 being the least important. Feel free to add your own suggestion
According to respondents opinion the ranking was as follow:
1. How to create an advocacy plan
2. How to talk and negotiate with high-level leaders and decision-makers
3. An overview of advocacy techniques and tactics
4. How to ensure policy change and hold governments accountable
5. How to make sure there will be good follow-up after the conference
6. Strategies to use in implementing the techniques in individual
countries.
AMONG SPANISH RESPONSES, THIS WAS THE RANKING
1. How to ensure policy change and hold governments accountable
2. How to create an advocacy plan
3. How to talk and negotiate with high-level leaders and decision-makers
4. An overview of advocacy techniques and tactics
--
Joya Banerjee | Program Coordinator | Global Youth Coalition on
HIV/AIDS | www.youthaidscoalition.org
joya (at) youthaidscoalition.org | 307 West 38th Street, Suite 1805 | New
York, NY 10018 | 212.661.6111 (phone) | 1-212-661-1933 (fax) |
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