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Amnesty International
Reporting on Rights
Every year the Politics Department enters the Amnesty International Young Human Rights Reporter of the Year competition. The brief for students is to produce an article highlighting a Human Rights abuse somewhere in the world. Khadijah Ismail in Year 10, wrote an article on Child Soldiers.
Child Soldiers: A frighteningly real issue
Throughout history, children have been misused in military operations so greatly; such practices are against the ethics our of society. Children are exploited in three ways. Firstly, they can be forced to undertake direct hostilities, for example, fi ghting on the frontline. Secondly, they are used for maintenance roles such as scouts, go-betweens or sentries. The third way is using them as human shields or for publicity. Although international agreements are put into place to try to limit the participation of children in armed confl icts, the Coalition to Stop the Use of Child Soldiers reports that use of children in military forces is still common. According to the Human Rights website, “In over twenty countries around the world children are direct participants in war, deprived of a childhood and exposed to shocking violence. An estimated number of 200,000 to 300,000 children are serving as soldiers for both rebel groups and government forces in existing confl icts”. The defi nition of child soldiers differs in different countries. In Africa there is a ruling which defi nes a child soldier as a person under the age of 18, who is part of any kind of equipped force or group. This description also includes girls recruited for sexual purposes, it does not just refer to a child who is carrying or has carried weapons. Up to half of the world’s child soldiers are in Africa; in the end credits of the fi lm ‘Blood Diamond’, it says that ‘there are still 200,000 child soldiers in Africa’. Many of these ‘invisible children’ are orphaned by violence. These children are as young as seven and are forced into confl ict due to poverty, abduction or have been deceived into joining. Imagine the psychological effect on the children involved. If adults come back from war severely disturbed and don’t want anyone else to experience it, what would these children feel? Roughly 90% of victims of war are civilians and approximately half of these are children. Countless children in war are regularly victim to accidental injuries or death due to their curiosity because land mines are designed to injure the enemy but they are the cause of deaths of around 10,000 children yearly. The Coalition to Stop the Use of Child Soldiers has reported thousands of children are involved in confl icts and ceasefi re situations in Burma, Indonesia and Nepal. However, government refusal of access to confl ict zones has made it tough to document records. In Iraq, the state has incorporated children as young as ten into ‘boot camps’ and then expected them to train for fourteen hours a day. In the UK, the minimum age to join the Armed Forces is sixteen although parental permission is required. The Convention on the Rights of the Child called on ratifying governments to do everything possible to ensure that young people under 18 don’t take part in hostilities. Children should grow up under conditions that allow them to achieve their full potential. For this to happen, they must be protected from any form of military recruitment by armed forces or groups involved in armed confl ict. Khadijah Ismail, Year 10
Community Hours
It has been a truly remarkable year, with students in Year 12 registering over 6500 hours of community action, with over 50 students achieving a v50 or v100 award for the charity ‘vInspired’. The whole school community has been involved in a range of projects, including the Harvest Festival in October, Operation Christmas Child, and the Hamper project.
Hajara Saleem
Ammaarrah Patel
Operation Christmas Child
The Shoebox Campaign gathered pace this year with the girls and staff making up 173 boxes of essential toiletries, stationary and small gifts for Children in Uganda.
Pocket Nook
Throughout the school year, sixth form students have been taking part in making an ‘under the sea’ themed wall hanging for local Autistic charity ‘Pocket Nook’. ‘Pocket Nook’ is a residential care home for young adults suffering with Autism. A group of sixth form students travelled to the care home and decided to make a wall hanging that would be positioned in the Sensory Room. The staff at Pocket Nook say: “ Staff at Pocket Nook want to send a very heartfelt thank you to all the students at the school who have supported us recently. We are so grateful for their time and efforts in making Pocket Nook a wonderful place for our young people with autism to live.”
Urban Outreach Hamper project
In December a group of 20 keen sixth-form students rose to the challenge of providing 600 variety packs of biscuits and 600 Christmas puddings in just 3 weeks for the Urban Outreach Hamper project, providing Christmas Dinner for needy families in Bolton. The pupils divided into two teams and then devised a range of enterprising money- making ideas, to include appeals on the local radio, fundraising at the Park Road Christmas fair and carol singing at Bolton train station during rush hour!
vInspired
Bolton School Sixth Form students won a place at the vInspired National Awards, held at the O2 Indigo in London, as a result of their outstanding commitment to volunteering. Bolton School has been ranked as one of the top schools in the country, with the highest proportion of students registering hours and achieving a v50 or v100 certifi cate.
Disability Snowsport
Polly Hughes and Katie Devine have attended sessions at the Chillfactore on a weekly basis, to help the charity provide exciting and life enhancing activities for individuals who require adaptive equipment or special instruction. This enables people with disabilities to take part in snow sports.
