At the heart of PST CRRC’s work is doing research for, about, and with children. Our aim is to provide a better understanding of children and childhood issues not only in the Philippines but also the rest of Southeast Asia and the Pacific regions.
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We have embarked on researches on a wide range of children’s issues such as sexual abuse, children’s participation, violence against children, child domestic workers, trafficking, children in conflict with the law, child pornography, emergency situations including natural disasters and armed conflicts, peace and conflict resolution, child labor, migration, indigenous communities, and other issues that impact on the lives of children. In doing research, we integrate theory and practice and make sure each enriches the other. True to the integrative nature of our research, our researches have contributed to the formulation of policies and programs that have made positive impacts on the lives of children and the protection of their rights as mandated by the UNICEF - Convention on the Rights of the Child. At the same time, our researches are contributing to theorizing childhood and children’s experiences in the Philippines and the Southeast Asia and the Pacific regions. Another hallmark of our research program is its interdisciplinary nature as it draws from the expertise of researchers who come from different fields in the social sciences such as psychology, political science, sociology, and social work and from the humanities as we also tap the expertise of theater and visual arts practitioners. One of the innovations we have made in research is to make all our researches participatory where our participants --- community members and children alike --- become partners in crafting the research. Thus, participants cease to be objects of research; instead, they become actively involved in the research process. Another innovation we have made is the use of creative research processes to gain access to children’s ideas, thoughts, and opinions in their own words, rather than in our words as adult researchers and practitioners. These methods include indigenous ones discovered and developed from the naturally existing patterns of culture. Lastly, part of our commitment is to disseminate our findings to the wider public, which includes parents, practitioners, children, and the community to ensure that children’s rights are not only upheld, but that people will have a deeper understanding and better appreciation of children and the issues that they face. |
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