Safe in civic spaces?
How do the tamariki and rangatahi of Aotearoa feel in civic spaces?
When we lived in Costa Rica, my son received civics education in his primary school. We were all learning Spanish and as a family we learned about la civica en el barrio, civics in the neighbourhood. The teachers encouraged us to visit the library, police station, council office, swimming pool and football field to talk about his safety in these public spaces, and report back to the class. It was a valuable project to do for our whānau when we didn’t speak the same language, have the same skin colour, know the culture or have social networks to rely on.
I’ve been thinking about this in the context of Local Government in Aotearoa. Do our children and young people consider our public and open spaces safe ? If children in Aotearoa did this exercise with their whānau next weekend, what would they share with their kaiako at kura on Monday at mat time?
Mana Mokopuna are the advocates for our 1.2 million tamariki and rangatahi and their latest piece of work is “Without racism Aotearoa would be better”. Mokopuna share their experiences of racism and solutions to end it.
I agree with the solutions the rangatahi offered, especially whakawhānaungātanga. Through relationships we can learn about each other. When we are face to face, we share space, share kai and enter relationships with a curious spirit, we can be familiar with each other, not be critical of the other.
At Local Board Level we can do more to reduce the racism children feel in public spaces:
Enable community centers through operational funding to run programmes which offer children and adults opportunities to share and celebrate their culture
Fund initiatives in our grant grounds which offer tamariki opportunities to learn and celebrate their culture in community spaces, like community theater. Watch Uproar on Netflix for ideas!
Fund initiatives which equip adults in community spaces to call out racism
Fund initiatives which promote restorative practice and provide people skills for restorative conversations
Ngā mihi nui tamariki and rangatahi of Aotearoa for telling us how racism is affecting you, your voice is ringing in my ears.
Listen and act. The young people of Aotearoa have asked Leaders to act. Government, Local and Central - Take Action. Just do something!
Global Trait Characterization Evaluation Lead
11moSorry I forgot to tag you Amit! Thank you so much for coming!