How to use this school page:
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This is the page to introduce yourselves to the other groups/classes in your Learning Circle and post all your challenge contributions.
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Please see the page 'Background information' for detailed information.
Giving and receiving feedback:
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On this school page you'll find text boxes for the feedback from the other groups in your Circle.
We ask you to give each school feedback on their work and contributions. -
If you want to give a brief remark to a group, please use the comment box at the bottom of the school page.
Introduction:
Welcome to Macedonia.
Welcome to the heart of the East, the city of Shtip. It is a city with a long history, rich tradition and culture. A city of dear and hospitable people.
Welcome to our secondary school “Kole Nehtenin”.
It is located at the entrance of the city and it is a school with 850 pupils from different fields of study and profiles: Electrical technicians, computer scientist, mechanical technicians, mechatronics, chefs and waiters.
Who are we?
We are five students coming from different parts of Macedonia, with different views, interests, ideas and ways of thinking.
We had a special class for answering the questions, and thanks to all the students in our school we got these answers:
- What are you allowed to do?
- What are you not allowed to do?
- We are allowed to hang out with whoever we want, to move freely, to express our opinions and to disrespect the moral norms.
- We are not allowed to drink alcohol, go/be out after curfew, especially after midnight.
- What do you have to do?
- What happens if there are no rules?
- What happens if there are too many rules?
- We have to go to school, respect the law, respect our parents and also leave the local after midnight. Also, we have to get regular medical check, get vaccinated and have health insurance.
- If there are no rules, there would be no order, everything is going to be chaos, we would do what we want, the peace would be disturbed and crime rates would go up.
- But, if there are too many rules, there is going be revolt, rebellion, more violations and protests.
- What rights do children in your country have?
- Do these also apply in different countries?
- All rights from the Constitution in the Republic of Macedonia apply to the children, except from voting in elections and choosing our religion and nationality.
- These rights partly apply in different countries.
- What should adults in your environment take care of?
- Why is this?
- They need to take care and provide clean environment and living conditions. Also, they need to take care of their kids, provide them with peace and tranquility and respect their rights and privacy.
- This is because they have responsibility, they need to put us on the right track and teach us what is good and what isn’t.
- What should the government take care of?
- Who decides?
- The government should provide safety, peace, education, living conditions, inclusion, clean environment.
- The state and the state institutions decide about all of this.
- When were you happy?
- Why were you happy?
- What do you need to be happy?
- We were happy when we got something we wanted, when we reached out goal.
- We were happy because we achieved something we strived for.
- We need our family, health, friends and money to be happy.
- Our primary needs (air, water, food) are what we need, something we can’t live without, but our secondary needs (material and cultural needs) are something we need to fulfill our lives.
- What is a basic need for you?
- Why is this a basic need?
- Our basic needs are air, water, food, home and being taken care of. And we need all of this to survive.
- The personal (right to live, of freedom, movement), the cultural (learn, create) and the social rights (social security, insurance and take) are fair and just for every child.
- We have to learn to get upset again, says Anthony Lake of UNICEF.
- What do you think? Would that help?
- We need to learn how to be defeated, how to be upset right and how to rise again as a person. We really feel that that would help the society a lot.
Contributions Challenges:
We chose this Challenge: Rights for girls & Equality
And this assignment: Assignment 1
Our learning goals are:
Our success criteria are:
Just like everywhere in the world, our country has and will face gender inequality. It can be seen in all segments of life starting from education, work, marriage, etc. The fight for equal rights isn't spread in our country as much as it is through the world.
Women and girls around the world face widespread violence, sexual harassment and abuse in many of the spaces that they populate – their homes, workplaces, on the streets and on public transport. Women’s fear of violence is an attack on their basic rights and prevents them from living full and equal lives.
They are systematically marginalized and discriminated against through patriarchal power relations that combine with other systems of subordinating and exploitative social relations to place them in even more constrained positions than men and boys in the same class, ethnic, age or other relations.
Throughout the world women and girls are forced to endure harmful practices that cause them great suffering. Everybody should start working with/for women to stop female genital mutilation, early or forced marriage, sex selective abortion, honor crimes and many other harmful practices.
A special case in our country is the forced and child marriage. It is mostly the result of family traditions and cultures and it is most common in the rural areas.
Based on the research in our school, as part of the project activities in relation to forced marriages, in our region of 31 surveyed children, we came to the following conclusions:
- 12 students out of 31 polled student answered that there are forced marriages in our region
- 10 students think that there are no forced marriages
- 9 students do not have information about it.
- 32% of respondents believe that forced marriages are part of the cultural tradition of this nation
- Half of the respondents believe that forced marriages exist in minority groups (Turks, Gypsies, Vlachs)
- Only a small proportion think that this happens in rural areas and in the poor families.
As the most common reasons for such marriages, students state the material benefits, non-education, tradition and preservation of the property.
Letter to UNICEF:
In this essay we are going to talk about our experience during this project and how much we have expended our knowledge about children's rights. Allow us to introduce ourselves first. We are a group of five members Pamela Redjepovska, Stefan Katrandjiski, Theodora Petkovska, Marko Stoimenovski and Filip Sarakinov, eighteen years old and newly graduates from the secondary school “Kole Nehtenin”, here in Stip, Macedonia. We studied and will continue our studies about computer engineering and programming. The fact that we study about technology and how it works, doesn’t stop us from learning more about other areas. Areas such as children’s rights.
Children are the most precious thing in our world. They and their rights need to be protected at all costs, because they deserve that. Signing up for this project we had no idea how much we would become aware. We knew children’s rights were different everywhere and they were treated differently, we just did not know that it was such a serious situation. One might ask, why children’s rights, we already have human rights? The minute a child is born, the parents realize that there is another life they need to look after. The child needs to be taken care of, it needs to be protected and loved. To have healthy food and water so it can grow up. To have a proper education so it can grow into a person who will give back to the world. To be free of discrimination and to be aware of its freedom of expression. Those are just a few of the fifty-four child’s rights in the OHCHR. Many children don’t enjoy the right to education because of their living conditions. Girls often suffer the consequences, because give precedence to sons when having to choose between them. Here we can also add child marriage and child labor. Some countries have a law where it states that finishing secondary school is obligatory. The story of the fourteen year old Zalissa Kabore was part of one of the assignments for this project. She was a girl who just wanted to study, get a degree and find a job. But, one day her father notified her that she had been given away in marriage. He soon realized that that tradition had to be discarded. To continue, during this project and the questionnaires we conducted we have come to the realization that a big number of children are not familiar with their rights. In our personal opinion, that is the reason why children don’t fight and don’t stand up for themselves when they need to, just like Zalissa did.
And that is the right we created. Every child should be introduced to their basic rights at a young age and growing up, one day they would be aware of them all. We should raise awareness of the importance of children’s rights all around the globe. No matter the age, all children are worthy of love, care and most importantly, deserve to be heard when they say: “That is my right and I own it”.
Evaluation:
Feedback from:
Florina from Birch Cliff Heights - Toronto, Canada
I agree when you said that girls are looked down upon but I think you should elaborate so like explain “why and how they are looked down upon” why do you think that girls are judged on getting drunk worse. Why is that boys can stay up more late. I like your statements but i think that you should extend it. Put your opinions on it.
Tanushree and Prapti
The situation is similar in Canada, as girls are constantly treated differently in society due to stereotypes.
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