Against the background of the crisis facing the nation’s children, the latest research on violence against children, child sexuality, parenting and other pressing issues concerning children’s rights will be unveiled on October 21-22, 2008 at the Jamaica Pegasus at the third Caribbean Child Research Conference.

Minister of Information, Youth, Culture and Sports, Olivia Grange will deliver the keynote address at the two-day Caribbean Child Research Conference, being held under the theme Promoting Child Rights through Research: Building a Region Fit for Children.

This year’s conference is being staged by the Sir Arthur Lewis Institute of Social and Economic Studies (SALISES) in association with the Planning Institute of Jamaica (PIOJ), Child Development Agency (CDA), Office of the Children’s Advocate (OCA), Early Childhood Commission (ECC), Caribbean Child Development Centre (CCDC) the Child Development Research Group, Jamaica Coalition on the Rights of the Child (JCRC), the Ministry of Education and CARICOM.

Researchers hailing from the Caribbean region, the United States and the United Kingdom will present their work, including a number of eminent Jamaican academics from UWI Mona, among them Dr. Maureen Samms Vaughan, Professor of Child Development and Behaviour; Dr. Aldrie Henry-Lee, Senior Research Fellow, SALISES; Elsa Leo-Rhynie, Professor Emerita, Distinguished Researcher 2007, UWI, Mona, and Professor Julie Meeks Gardner, Head of CCDC.   

Over 200 students from across Jamaica will converge at the conference to learn more about the issues emerging from the research and to participate in the sessions. In keeping with the tradition of the conference, an outstanding child researcher and a distinguished adult researcher or institution will be honored for their research on children’s issues.  

Each year, the multi-disciplinary conference aims to share the most current research on children, strengthen the network of researchers on children’s issues, and encourage new research in areas that are often under-researched. Knowledge generation and the use of disaggregated/child-specific data are essential for evidence-based policy development, planning, programming, legislation review and reform.

For more information, please contact:

Allison Hickling, UNICEF Jamaica, 926-7584/5, ahickling@unicef.org

Claudette Myers, PIOJ, 960-9339, ext. 5062, claudette_myers@pioj.gov.jm

Patricia Valentine, UWI Mona Public Relations Office, 977-5941, patricia.valentine02@uwimona.edu.jm

E-mail: childconference08@gmail.com