Good practice in youth co-design
MYAN pledges to share good practice and provide policy and technical support to enhance adolescent and youth-focussed responses in policy and programming in host communities and the forced migration context. Young people have specific rights, needs and capabiltiies in the protection and migration/settlement context and are important actors in building welcoming and inclusive societies. However, these considerations are often overlooked. MYAN will address this issue in its pledge. MYAN will draw on its expertise as a national leader in delivering and supporting good practice with young people - in policy, programming and capacity building (across sectors and with young people), and in meaningful youth participation.
There is a need for:
1. Youth engagement and empowerment – engaging actively with youth in an ongoing and meaningful basis to seek their ideas and input, and supporting youth to analyse, understand, and advocate on issues of importance to themselves and their communities. 2. Youth focused protection – in particular, acknowledging the specific protection concerns of youth with disabilities, the specific protection concerns of youth from social, ethnic, and religious minorities and acquainting LGBTI youth with their rights. 3. The physical and emotional wellbeing of youth – ensuring services for mental health and psychological support to address the emotional difficulties associated with forced displacement, discrimination and isolation. 4. Generating data on youth – the importance of collecting evidence through disaggregated data on youth to support the building of youth specific responses and to increase accountability.
To deliver on this pledge, MYAN will: build on our existing stakeholder relationships (including with the Red Cross, Department of Home Affairs, Host International, and other partner NGOs across Australia) develop new partnerships (e.g. with INGOs, CBOs/civil society and states - in host countries) and build on our work in relation to strengthening the migration and settlement of children and adolescents at risk. This pledge addresses: (i) the need and critical role that migration and human movement plays for children/adolescents at risk and the positive contributions they make to host countries , (ii) strategies to strengthen the effectiveness and integrity of processes to enable and expand settlement for young people, (iii) barriers/gaps in practice and in the evidence base/knowledge to support the expansion of migration for young people and (iv) existing good practice in forced migration and settlement of young people at risk.
