The European Network on Independent Living and Disability Rights International are holding a webinar on ‘Family and Community Integration of Children under the UN Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities (CRPD): Implications for Group Homes and Residential Care of New Human Rights Standards and Findings from Research’.
The webinar will take place on 30 April, 9 – 11 am EST, 2-4 pm GMT (3-5 pm CET).
The webinar will seek to clarify States Parties’ obligations under the CRPD, in comparison to more dated standards, such as the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child (CRC) and guidance provided by the UN Guidelines for the Alternative Care of Children. We will also have an opportunity to hear from experts studying the harm caused to children by placement in residential care settings (such as large institutions, group homes, family-type homes, special hospitals etc.). With efforts underway at the international level to reconcile different approaches to the right of the child to grow up in a family – in the CRPD, CRC and the UN Guidelines – the webinar will address some of the following questions: how to ensure every child can grow up in a family, is residential care justified in any circumstance, how to ensure that children growing up in group homes and other residential care settings are given an opportunity to access family-based care, and the right to independent living.
We will hear from the UN Special Rapporteur on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities Catalina Devandas Aguilar, as well as experts from the Harvard Medical School and the John Hopkins University & Kennedy Krieger Institute. The disability community will be represented by Disability Rights International and TASH, and the European Network on Independent Living.
To download the agenda, please click here.
To find out more about the speakers, please click here.
Materials from the webinar:
To watch the webinar recording, please click here.
To download DRI/ENIL/Validity Foundation/TASH position paper on the right to family, please click here.
Presentations:
Dr. Charles Nelson III [presentation]
Dr. Joan Kaufman [presentation] [research paper 1] [research 2]
Dr. Ruthie-Marie Beckwith [presentation]
