Global focus on young people in disaster

The voices of children and young people were loud and clear at a disaster resilience conference recently held in Portugal.

Over 130 international stakeholders from policy, research and practice gathered at the University of Lisbon in May for the CUIDAR Cultures of Disaster Resilience Among Children and Young People project, including CRC project leader Dr Briony Towers from RMIT University.

Dr Towers presented at the opening of the event, where she spoke about the importance of student voice and participation in disaster resilience education and showcased the child-led approach to bushfire education that is being implemented at Strathewen Primary School in Victoria.

“There was a lot of interest in the child-led approach being employed at Strathewen and other schools such as Anglesea Primary School, where the benefits of amplifying student voice and participation in disaster resilience education have been coming through really clearly,” Dr Towers said.

Strathewen Primary School was destroyed in the 2009 Black Saturday bushfires and Dr Towers has since been studying how the school’s innovative approach to bushfire education is empowering children to become active participants in bushfire risk reduction in their community.  

The ‘Strathewen Model’ attracted attention from European delegates who were interested in developing similar child-centred approaches to disaster resilience education and community engagement.

Practical workshop activities over the two-day event encouraged delegates to visualise and conceptualise how to make young people more visible in disasters.

”It was wonderful to explore the various methodologies and tools that the CUIDAR team have been using to support children’s participation in disaster risk management planning and decision-making.

“It was also exciting to see how the CUIDAR project has influenced adults’ assumptions about children’s roles in disaster risk management. There is a major shift occurring and it is being driven by methodologies that privilege children’s perspectives and experiences,” Dr Towers said.

Delegates came from a variety of countries including Portugal, Spain, Greece, Italy, Japan, USA, Belgium, Australia and the United Kingdom.

Dr Towers also travelled to Toronto, Canada, in July to present at the XIX ISA World Congress of Sociology. As part of the session on children, youth and disasters, she presented on the role of disaster resilience education in disaster recovery.

While disaster resilience education for children and young people has not always been present in recovery, Briony’s research at Strathewen has found that the quality disaster resilience education can a positive effect on student well-being and development.  

“When we studied the outcomes of the program being delivered at Strathewen, we found that the children had developed a very strong sense of agency in relation to assessing and reducing bushfire risk in their area, which has really helped them to manage their bushfire related fears and anxieties.

“For children living in a community that was so heavily impacted by the Black Saturday disaster, this is significant. But there is currently nothing in place to support this kind of programming in other disaster affected communities, and we need to address that,” Dr Towers said.

Briony concluded her travels in Colorado at the 43rd Natural Hazards Workshop, which considered 20 questions to help reduce disaster risk in communities.

The questions focused on variety of topics including the role of the public service; responsibility; planning, information sharing and the environmental and social factors contributing to natural hazards.

Dr Towers was recently recognised with the CRC’s Early Career Researcher Award at AFAC18 for her contributions to child-centred disaster risk reduction and disaster education research.

Read the Strathewan report here.