Children & Youth Global Strategy for Working with Children and Youth in Transforming Conflict

Published by Search for Common Ground (SFCG), this document sets out the vision, strategic goals, and core initiatives to guide the work of the organisation's Children and Youth Unit and provides a framework for the development of work with children, youth, and conflict for Children and Youth across all field offices and programmes. The strategic plan outlined in this paper was produced in response to the identification of SFCG's identification of its work with children and youth as one of the primary strategic priorities of the organisation, and is intended to be used as a guide for SFCG Children and Youth staff globally. To support that intent, the document concludes with a case study of a regional children and youth strategy as an example of development strategy using the specific context of the region or country as the basis for development.

The plan identifies 6 strategic goals and core initiatives to achieve SFCG's goals of strengthening institutional coordination in the field of children, youth, and conflict. Some of the activities included in these initiatives include:

• Create a "global community of practice" through staff inter-programme learning visits and international exchange opportunities, conferences, newsletters, and creation of informational databases to document experiences and lessons learned;
• Produce and publish a toolkit and related trainings providing information on how to design, implement, monitor, and evaluate youth programmes;
• Strengthen existing programmes such as youth leadership trainings, radio, and soap opera productions, developing case studies to support good programming methodology, academic development opportunities, and organisation staff trainings and workshops;
• Expand and replicate successful programmes such as children's soap operas and development of materials to guide key actors when addressing the issue of child soldiers in conflict zones;
• Develop new programmes such as peace-building education and creation of training tools for use by youth organisations globally; and
• Create networks of young people and institutions that promote initiatives around integration of youth in the global development agenda.