Collaboration for Change: Adult Empowerment and Promotion of Children’s Rights through Local Partnerships
I really like being able to help my community, whatever I learn and experience, I like sharing it with others.
— Celeste F. Avenido
Empowering children involves empowering adults, too. For people in their respective communities – especially those in a position to bring about change – awareness of children’s rights and concern for their welfare can help influence others and implement changes that matter.
Celeste was her family’s breadwinner, working as a laundress and cook. In 2014 she volunteered for a Kalahi‐CIDSS program addressing her barangay’s lack of a proper drainage canal. Seeing how the problem affected her family and her community firsthand encouraged her to get involved.
She headed the Technical Working Group and the Barangay Sub-project Management Committee (a position she held until 2024) handling the budget of the sub-project and monitoring the procurement of supplies and materials. Apart from empowering her community, the work also provided extra income which she used for her son’s school needs.
Kalahi-CIDSS. The Kapit-Bisig Laban sa Kahirapan (arms linked against poverty) – Comprehensive and Integrated Delivery of Social Services is a poverty alleviation program of the Philippine Department of Social Welfare and Development (DSWD). It uses the community-driven development (CDD) approach that allows barangays of targeted municipalities to become empowered to achieve improved access to services and participate in more inclusive local planning, budgeting, and implementation.
Continuing to help
In 2020 Celeste helped barangay health workers (BHW) address needs during the pandemic. She assisted in monitoring COVID-19 cases, conducting home visits alongside the BHWs, informing community members, and providing them access to vaccines. She even volunteered to sew curtains used for quarantine/isolation areas.
In 2021 she worked as a barangay tanod (public safety officer) and in 2023 was appointed as the VAWC (Violence Against Women and Children) Desk Officer of Poblacion, Sibulan.
Continuing to learn
Her years of service provided opportunities for education and training such as the awareness-raising and capacity-building activities conducted by Terre des Hommes Netherlands partner Children’s Legal Bureau. Celeste attended seminars and workshops on laws protecting children, on child labour, and the worst forms of child labour. These proved to be enriching and allowed her to provide guidance to youth and child’s rights advocates as a mentor, leader, and guardian.
It also made her more proactive in her role as a VAWC Desk Officer. Celeste encourages young people to participate and engage in activities. In return, the youth of the community admire Ate (big sister) Celeste for her perseverance, dedication, sincerity and passion for advocacy.
Sharing knowledge and insights
Celeste also actively shares the information she learns from the project’s awareness-raising activities. Being aware of the existing laws in place, she makes sure that parents in the community are also aware that their children may be vulnerable to being exploited due to their lack of parenting guidance.
Since we have these laws, we should not just leave our children be. For example, in trafficking, we should not risk letting our children be exposed to strangers. We should not let them roam around anywhere by themselves since it puts them at risk since we cannot always know what kind of people they interact with and what their intentions are. Beware of that. Prevention is better than cure.
— Celeste F. Avenido
