CDCD: explained

CDCD explained

Civic Driven Child Development (CDCD) is about enabling children, adolescents, parents, caretakers, families, schools and communities to act in the best interest of the child.

A process where we try to stimulate people to organise themselves, claim their rights and take up their responsibility as a parent, teacher, child and government official.

ICS Asia’s pioneering civic driven child development (CDCD) approach strives to build on existing civic structures that will result in bringing about positive sustainable change for children.

With education serving as a main entry point in the ICS Asia strategy, there is an additional emphasis on access to quality primary education which acknowledges and reinforces ICS Asia’s efforts to ensure that:

• Children and their communities are involved in the governance of the school and that the School Management Committees (SMC) is fully accountable in fulfilling its role
• Root causes which hinder children from accessing education are dealt with at the community level through strengthened systems and mechanisms and enhanced capacity of those responsible
• Government plans, including Child Friendly School (CFS), have been shared and discussed at the village level.

ICS Asia is firmly established in the region through its many years of working with communities and its added value is two-fold:

1. Holistic (protection, education, health, HIV/AIDS and livelihoods) CDCD work in and with communities towards the realization of child rights.
2. Geographically targeted programmes with country offices being located in the implementation areas. These allow ICS Asia to work closely with local government authorities and other local partners.

As ICS Asia formulates its strategic work for the year 2010, it not only requires an internal examination but it also needs to consider the applicable external factors. Although ICS Asia has had a continued presence in the region for many years and is reasonably aware of the particulars of the Greater Mekong Sub-Regional context, there are continual changing circumstances of which ICS Asia needs to keep abreast.

Equally, ICS Asia is aware of and committed to the achievement of global initiatives such as the Millennium Development Goals and Education for All.

ICS Asia supports national strategies, such as those outline in relevant Poverty Reduction Strategy Papers of Thailand, Cambodia, Lao PDR and the Philippines, as well as all related local (provincial, district and commune level) government plans, priorities and structures.