News

Here we keep you posted with the project’s current news, events and priorities. In this phase of the project our central aim is to ensure that the resources are piloted so they can develop into really effective teaching tools.

On this page we also look a how the press and various publications have reported on Eye to Eye and Save the Children’s work on child labour.

(See Eye to Eye in the press, below)

Project news

• Piloting Pack now out
  If you are a teacher and have just heard about Eye to Eye it’s not too late to get involved. Pilot materials this year and make a positive contribution to the teaching pack that we will produce for the 2008 curriculum.
• Partnership with Teach First
  Save the Children has been strengthening its links with Teach First and offering piloting opportunities for teachers with a passion for education that challenges and helps work towards justice.
• Pakistan and India film trips
  Programme manager Mark Thorpe visited Pakistan to get footage for a short film to support the Eye to Eye materials from that region. “It was a very busy week but it was a really engaging trip and we gained a greater understanding directly from the children about life there and the problems which are forcing children to work on the carpet looms.” In November, Rachele Tardi, an education worker on the Eye to Eye project, visited India for the same purpose.
• Assemblies and exhibition
  We have just launched a UK exhibition which is currently touring schools – please contact us if you could support this or host it.

Eye to Eye and child labour in the press

Part of our objective is to raise awareness more widely about the issues behind child labour. For this reason we look not only for strong partnerships, but also for press coverage. Save the Children’s work on child labour and the Eye to Eye project have both featured in the national and international press.

Eye to Eye had a feature article in the TES (PDF), which is usually read in every Secondary School (if not by every teacher!), on 8 December 2006.

The project also was presented as a pioneering project in the article “How’s work?” featured in the “Developments” magazine produced by DFID that brings development issues to a wider audience in the UK.

Save the Children UK’s recent work in India has been pushing for change in the law regarding child domestic workers and also change in attitudes within society in India. In 2006 an article in the Times Newspaper (PDF) explored the impact that Save the Children had on the legal changes around child domestic work in the country.

Our main focus with regards child labour has always been the eradication of the worst forms of child labour. In 2007, the anniversary year of the abolition of the international slave trade, we brought out a report on modern day child slavery, “Small hands of Slavery”. (See Downloads)

Child labour in the media

Eye to Eye keeps an eye on the media’s take on child labour issues.

Last year was the anniversary of the abolition of the slave trade whilst Eye to Eye reminds us of the reality of modern day slavery.

Programmes on the BBC last summer on India and Pakistan explored the effects of poverty in the countries as well as their progress. Ragi Omaar investigated the phenomenon of child labour around the world in a moving hour-long documentary. Let us know if you missed it.

BBC Newsnight investigated child labour in the Cocoa industry. Most recently another scandal in which GAP was implicated in child labour within its supply chain occurred.

We have yet to see how much child labour will feature in the news throughout 2008. We’d love to hear from you if you pick up on any news stories, features or articles around the theme of child labour.