Pelotas becomes world’s 3rd Pathfinder City in Global Partnership to End Violence Against Children

 

Pelotas is the third city in the world to become a UN Pathfinding City within the Global Partnership to End Violence Against Children and Adolescents. Along with the title, the city makes a commitment to eradicating violence against children through a network of collaboration, knowledge exchange and evidence-based programming.

The selection of Pelotas is the result of a successful collaborative relationship between the federal public university and the local government. On the one side, there is the Human Development and Violence Research Centre (DOVE), linked to the Postgraduate Programme in Epidemiology at the Federal University of Pelotas, which brings together experts dedicated to studying child development and the causes, consequences and prevention of violence. On the other side, since 2017, the municipal administration has sustained the Pelotas Pact for Peace, a public policy that includes 17 projects to fight the root causes of violence.

Upon learning of the Pact, DOVE Director Joseph Murray identified fertile ground for adding two interventions linked to DOVE’s field of research on violence prevention through evidence-based programmes. In joint action with the municipality, the researchers helped to implement, in 2018, and now assess the impact of two programmes targeting children and families in the Pelotas community. Both aim to guide families on how to raise children based on affection and how to stimulate children’s cognitive development in interaction with them. One is a book-sharing initiative aimed at stimulating children’s socio-cognitive development and, at the same time, strengthening dialogue and family ties. Another, the ACT Raising Safe Kids Programme, educates mothers about child development and positive parenting skills, teaching them to respond to everyday situations with positive ways to educate. The results, which will be jointly analysed by Oxford University in England, should be published in 2021. With the approach between the themes, DOVE has become one of the research centres that make up the Global Partnership.

In a statement to the Partnership website, DOVE’s director stresses the importance of early prevention programs that aim to avoid “the profound effects of violence on children in the long term, which overcome visible scars and marks”.

As a Pathfinding City, Pelotas will be able to strengthen its current programming and learn from the work of other cities, including Valenzuela, in the Philippines, and São Paulo, in Brazil. The Global Partnership steering committee believes that the work with the Pelotas Pact for Peace may also be a reference within the network, supporting other countries and cities in the adaptation of this work to local contexts, while presenting the evidence of the impact that these programs can achieve on the prevention of violence and the promotion of children’s socio-cognitive development.

As a Pathfinding City, Pelotas will be able to strengthen its current programming and learn from the work of other cities, including Valenzuela, in the Philippines, and São Paulo, in Brazil. The Global Partnership steering committee believes that the work done in Pelotas may also be a reference within the network, supporting other countries and cities in the adaptation of this work to local contexts, while presenting the evidence of the impact that these programs can achieve on the prevention of violence and the promotion of children’s socio-cognitive development.