Child Led Indicators: Pilot testing a child participation tool for psychosocial support programs for former child soldiers in Nepal

Karki R., Kohrt B.A., Jordans M.J.D.,

Intervention

Published on: July 2009

Abstract: There is increasing attention given to participatory projects with marginalized children and young people, in the absence of child protection. In Nepal, a process was developed to provide a framework for more systematic participation of children in psychosocial programming, geared towards facilitating the reintegration for former child soldiers. The process development followed seven steps with the children, including culturally grounded concepts of psychosocial well-being and problems, desired outcomes, utilization of existing resources, responsive activities and development of indicators in order to monitor project activities. The result was a series of Child Led Indicators (CLI), which represented markers of psychosocial well-being that children prioritized, recognized in others, and could monitor throughout a project cycle. Development and implementation of the CLI tool revealed a number of challenges to the implementation and effectiveness of participatory tools for children, which echo the growing the critique of participatory programming. This paper will describe the framework as well as the results of a pilot CLI implementation.

https://doi: 10.1097/WTF.0b013e3283302725