For the first time, the UN Guidelines for the Alternative Care of Children will be shared with learners around the world, including policy makers and practitioners, in a free online course titled Getting Care Right for All Children. This Massive Open Online Course (MOOC) has been developed by academics and practitioners from Centre for Excellence for looked After Children in Scotland with the support of Education Enhancement at the University of Strathclyde.
Across the globe, for many different reasons, hundreds of thousands of children cannot live with their parents. To address this, the UN General Assembly unanimously welcomed the Guidelines for the Alternative Care of Children in 2009 driven by two fundamental principles — the ensuring of both the necessity and the suitability of alternative care.
Alternative care is the provision of a safe and caring setting for children to live whilst they are unable to stay with their families —foster care being one example of this.
The course is offered in partnership with the social learning platform, Futurelearn and will be available in English with some course materials (including text and videos) also accessible in Spanish and French.
The initial concept for the course was proposed and sponsored by the Geneva Working Group on Children Without Parental Care, comprising of a number of major international child protection and child care organisations.
For details, visit https://www.futurelearn.com/courses/alternative-care.