Street Action - Committed to street children through action and partnership

Last year Street Action was involved in a research project focusing on the physical and psychosocial health of street children in Durban, including a focus on the HIV prevalence rate amongst the existing children living on the streets. Funded by the British Government's Department for International Development (DFID), it was conducted in partnership with the University of Kwa-Zulu Natal and Umthombo Street Children. The aim of the project was to provide objective data to describe children's experiences on the street and to describe the range of services (or lack of) directed at them. The research intends to provide insights and perspectives that, even if not exhaustive, could update and better guide responses and services to these children. We hope to publish more substantial information on the development of the research on our site very soon.

Prior to any public dissemination of results, the research team made a commitment to feed back the analysis of the data and a summary of the findings to the children who participated in the workshops and, where possible, to the children who participate in the health survey. On Wednesday 18 February over 70 children packed into Umthombo’s new Safe Space centre to participate in an especially designed evaluation session to feedback the results from the workshops held with the children last September 2008. The research process was structured to take into account the itinerant lifestyle of the children and the fact that many of them had not been involved in focused activities such as drawing and talking for some time. The evaluation was led by Glynis Clacherty, Director of Clacherty and Associates. The session was designed to tell the research team whether they ‘agreed’ or ‘disagreed’ with the finding using interactive methods or drawing, painting and writing and conversation.

Street Action and Umthombo Street children are committed to ensure that the outcome of this research remains child focused and that the voices of the street children are authentically heard. Joe Walker, co-director of Street Action and co-author of the research report, informed the children that they remained the most important people in this study and without their input this research would not have become a reality. The completed study will be published later this year and Street Action will host a launch in London.