Archived decisions

RIGHTS, RESPECT AND RESPONSIBILITIES IN HAMPSHIRE SCHOOLS : TRANSFORMING SCHOOLS AND COMMUNITIES

1. The Cabinet has endorsed warmly the Rights, Respect and Responsibilities programme and its further development within Hampshire Schools. This innovative project is based on the work already undertaken with considerable success in schools in Cape Breton, Canada, an area suffering from the decline of its traditional heavy industries. The project sets out to teach children about the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child so that those children may understand that not only do they have rights to be safe and to have a good quality education, for example, but also that other people - their classmates, their teachers and their parents - have rights too, and each person has responsibility to respect those. Early evaluations from pilot work in Hampshire Schools in Andover and Eastleigh have come to broadly the same conclusions as those from the work in Cape Breton. Some remarkable changes have occurred in classrooms where this work has been undertaken, to such an extent that, in one school, other teachers who had not been involved in the programme became very eager to join. There has already been evidence, too, that pupils were beginning to use the language of human rights in their classroom discussions.

2. Some virement has been possible within the Education budget for the current financial year to allow this project to begin and, in addition, grant aid of £50,000 has been obtained from the Innovations Unit of the Department for Education and Skills.

3. This activity will support all six of the Aims of the Corporate Strategy and in particular, Aim 5, Improving Services.

4. Evaluation of the initiative as it is developed across Hampshire's primary schools will be overseen by Sussex University and the Cabinet will continue to monitor progress closely.