Has the Child Participated in a Childen Friendly School? (Children Right^s Analysis of the Implementation of Child Friendly Schools in Surakarta)
Siany Indria Liestyasari- Ravik Karsidi- Asrowi- Abdul Rahman

Universitas Sebelas Maret, Surakarta

Abstract

This paper aims to describe and analyse the participation of children in the implementation of Child-Friendly School program in Surakarta. Protection for children is absolutely necessary to prepare the nation^s next generation even though it cannot be separated from various problems. Child-friendly schools are an affirmative movement for the fulfilment and protection of children^s rights in the field of education by promoting the principles of children centeredness, inclusiveness, gender equality and participatory democracy. Children^s participation is an important part for ensuring that children are involved, respected and heard in school policies regarding the fulfilment of their rights. However, socio-cultural barriers and misconception about participation often make children^s involvement in school unable to be considered as children^s participation.
Qualitative method with a phenomenological approach used to explain the question. Data collection techniques were carried out through a several indepth interviews with a number of informant (teacher, parent, and students), an observation at two schools in Surakarta. Questionnaire used to describe the condition of child-friendly school implementation spread over students in two school especially to describe the children^s participation. Data analyses was carried out interactively within the children^s rights analytical framework.
The result of the study show that children have not fully participated in child-friendly schools. Their participation is just defined by principals, teachers, and students itself as an involvement in various schools activities and not at the level of ideas. This means that there are still many local school policies that do not include children^s participation in their implementation but only include students as a participants in various activities carried by school. Children^s participation is still a pseudo participaton.

Keywords: Child-Friendly Schools, Children^s Participation, Children^s Rights

Topic: Education