[WiLT] Human Rights and Community Empowerment - 16th June

[WiL Admin]

Human Rights and Community Empowerment

16 June 2009
10am-4.30pm

Cost: £60- £175, depending on organisational income

Open to all community sector organisations

Organised in partnership with the British Institute of Human Rights, Urban Forum
and Community Sector Coalition, this one day course will explore the ideas and
principles of human rights and how they relate to current community issues in
the UK.

Course brief:  Human Rights and Community Empowerment - 16th June 2009

Summary: The essence of community empowerment - effective participation,
autonomy, fairness and dignity - goes straight to the heart of human rights.
Making the direct link to human rights therefore has enormous potential to
support community empowerment agendas. This one day course seeks to unlock this
potential by exploring the ideas and principles of human rights and how they
relate to current community issues in the UK. It will give an overview of
international human rights laws through to our own domestic legislation - the
Human Rights Act - and explore how these can be directly applied to your
specific areas of work. Whether you are an activist, or more involved in policy
change or civic participation, this course will support you with a range of
practical human rights methods and tools which you can begin to apply
practically and confidently to your work.
Target group: Community Sector organisations in the UK.

Level: No prior knowledge of human rights is required.

Learning objectives: By end of the course, participants should be able to:·
Understand what human rights are - the key features, principles and standards of
human rights.· Understand the key features of the international and domestic
human rights legal system and be able to explain how this is relevant to
community groups and organisations. There will be particular focus on the Human
Rights Act.· Have a deeper understanding of the way the Human Rights Act works
in practice - looking specifically at the rights, how they work and how they
differ from each other.· Identify which specific human rights can be applied to
a range of community empowerment issues and what that might look like in
practice.

Course Outline: · The Ideas: Introduction to the origins, principles and
development of human rights and how they relate to your work.· The law: An
overview of human rights law, focussing on international and UK human rights
legislation.· The practice: Exploring the articles of the Human Rights Act and
how they relate to community empowerment issues in practice using case study
work. · Action: Applying and testing human rights to real case studies and
developing an action plan for your organisation.

Format/length: This course is interactive with a mix of presentations,
discussions, group and individual exercises and action planning. The session
will run over one day from 10am-4.30pm with an hour's break for lunch and a
morning and afternoon refreshment break.

Accessibility: BIHR is committed to ensuring that people's individual needs are
met. This course will be held in a fully accessible venue and BSL interpreters
will be provided as required. Please state any specific requirements you have on
the downloadable booking form:
http://www.bihr.org.uk/documents/training/open-training-courses-booking-form

Training provider: The British Institute of Human Rights (BIHR) is a national
independent charity with an overall mission of bringing human rights to life for
everyone in the UK. One of our core activities is building the capacity of those
working to tackle inequality and injustice to use human rights based approaches
in their work. We are the leading provider of human rights training in the UK
for both the third sector and the public sector. You can find out more about our
work at www.bihr.org.uk.

Course costs:Costs are on a sliding scale based on organisational income:
Org income : Cost
£0-250K : £60
£250-500K : £100
£500K+ : £175

There are a limited number of free bursary places available for organisations
with a low income (under £25K). For more information on how to apply for a
bursary place please visit www.bihr.org.uk/open-training-courses/bursary-places

Venue: Amnesty International UK The Human Rights Action Centre 17-25 New Inn
Yard London EC2A 3EA

Further information: for further details and to book, please visit BIHR's
website at www.bihr.org.uk/open-training-courses, or contact Sonia or Amanda on
training at bihr.org.uk or 020 7848 1879.