Romanian Institute for Human Rights
Training courses
Education is not a privilege, but a fundamental right allowing for and facilitating enjoyment of the other rights of the child, making a contribution to the latter’s harmonious development, as well as to the economic, social and cultural welfare of society.
Human rights education is an integral part of the right to education, as essential instrument for the application and observance of rights and freedoms.
Courses organized in 2020
May 4-18
The Romanian Institute for Human Rights organized and held the online course ”Harmful games and violent practices in the school environment”, addressed to teachers in the pre-university education system. The course was carried over two weeks, lasted a total of 15 hours and was shared on educational platforms.
The activities coordinated by RIHR representative aimed at developing and solving applied exercises through interactive webinars, based on information support structured on learning modules, which included, among others: general notions of children’s rights; general presentation of the right to play and recreational activities; detailing the content of the right to play (based on Article 31 of the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child and General Comment No. 17 of the UN Committee on the Rights of the Child). At the same time, it addressed topics such as game types, game selection criteria, game impact, the connection between the right to play and other rights; defining harmful games; categories of potentially dangerous games; physical and psychological consequences of violent games; the motivation to choose such games; warning signs and ways of intervention at the school level.
At the end of the course, teachers were evaluated, both on the newly acquired notions and their use in actual work with students, and of the structure and content of the course, the conclusion being that most participants would adopt and apply the work strategies and types of cooperation games proposed by the trainer.
The course was attended by teachers from the following schools/high schools in Bucharest: ”Federico Garcia Lorca” Middle School, ”Grigore Tocilescu” Middle School, Middle School no. 88, Middle School no. 86, ”Ştefan Odobleja” High School, ”Decebal” High School, ”Dimitrie Gusti” Technological High School.
March 19 – April 2
Tosupport the teachers and students who, during this period, carry out their educational activity by using alternative means of communication, Romanian Institute for Human Rights offers an online course session, available on Google Classroom educational platform.
The course “Online learning about the right to education” is being disseminated by collaborators from schools, inspectorates and teaching staff resource centers and is addressed to students from 5th to 7th grades.
The provided educational materials include theoretical aspects, synthesized and adapted to the level of the students, as well as practical activities such as essays, quizzes, games and fine arts creations.
Three schools from three different counties participated at the course (”George Poboran” Middle School, Slatina; ”Take Ionescu” Middle School, Râmnicu Vâlcea; ”Mihai Viteazu” Middle School, Pucioasa), involving teachers and school counselors.
Through the creative solutions offered to the proposed activities, the works of the participating children (from 5th and 6th grades) aimed at understanding the rights and the importance of assuming the responsibilities that they have. Moreover, the course aimed to actively involve young people in promoting and protecting their right to education.
March 5
„A history of discrimination for kids” was the name chosen for the course RIHR held at „Prof. Ion Vișoiu” School in Chitila. The event took place in the context of “School in a different way” national programme and targeted seventh grade students.
Following the introductory discussions that involved the entire class in a process of negotiation, a unanimously accepted definition for discrimination was found. Subsequently, it was compared with two official definitions of discrimination present in two reference instruments in the field of human rights: the European Convention on Human Rights and the Charter of Fundamental Rights of the EU. The examples of the types of discrimination provided by these instruments represented the starting point for a debate on discriminatory situations encountered by children in class, school or in society.
Looking back, the children were engaged in an imaginary journey that targeted key historical moments for the typology and variety of forms of discrimination. Thus, the students identified vulnerable categories that, during the evolution of the society, suffered or were subjected to degrading treatments, because of innate characteristics such as: race, skin color, gender, age, ethnicity.
March 4, March 9
A new group of trainees from the Detention and Preventive Arrest Centers has completed the module „Prevention of torture and inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment”, which is part of the program developed by the Institute of Studies for Public Order and held by the Romanian Institute for Human Rights.
The course covered topics such as: human rights instruments and mechanisms at international and regional level; European Convention on Human Rights; European Court of Human Rights - history and procedure; torture – definition, in the context of the international system (Convention against Torture and Other Cruel, Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or Punishment) and detailing the conditions for applying the right not to be subjected to torture in the ECHR case law; torture and degrading treatment - differentiation; inhuman and degrading treatments; examples of torture, inhuman and degrading treatment in detention; ECHR case law.
The training session was held over two days and gathered participants from County Police Inspectorates and/or Detention and Preventive Arrest Centers from Satu Mare, Neamț, Harghita, Arad, Brașov, Teleorman, Giurgiu, Sibiu, Prahova, Caraș-Severin, București, Suceava, Timiș, Bistrița-Năsăud, Gorj, Vaslui, Mureș și Olt.
At the end of the module, the participants were able to test and apply the knowledge acquired during the course, by solving some problems proposed by the RIHR representative.
February 18 - 19
In the light of the partnership between the Romanian Institute for Human Rights and the Institute of Studies for Public Order, a training session was organised for police members working for the Centres for Preventive Detention and Arrest in the country.
The training session was aimed at acquainting participants with international/regional legislation and mechanisms to combat and prevent torture implemented on international and European level. Theoretical aspects were combined with debating cases of the European Court of Human Rights and analysing the evolution of severity degrees of ill-treatment established by Court decisions.
During the course, a simulated court process was organized, aiming to establish an algorithm that would allow the correct qualification, from legal perspective, of the ill-treatment and torture.
The training course involved participants, from Bucharest and other counties (Timiș, Neamț, Hunedoara, Sibiu, Vâlcea, Harghita, Giurgiu, Mehedinți, Caraș-Severin, Botoșani, Satu-Mare, Olt, Dolj, Alba).
February 14, February 21
The Romanian Institute for Human Rights organized and held a two-day course, of a total of 6 hours, for lawyers from the Bucharest Bar Association.
The theme of the course was designed following the request of participants and covered areas of interest specific to their profession and specialisation. The identified needs were: explanations on terminology used in the field of human rights, applicability of regional human rights instruments (the European Convention on Human Rights, the Charter of Fundamental Rights of the European Union), a better understanding of the categories of rights and their evolution as well as procedural details of European courts.
Thus, the course “Regional Human Rights Instruments and Mechanisms” was structured on the following objectives: brief presentation of the historical evolution of human rights, analysis of the main instruments adopted at regional and international level that have as objective the protection of rights and freedoms, information regarding control mechanisms of the aforementioned instruments, as well as the analysis of the relationship between them within the European space.
Moreover, the debates focused on analysing the differences and similarities between the two European instruments of human rights protection – the European Convention of Human Rights and the Charter of Fundamental Rights of the European Union. Particular attention was paid to the comparative analysis of the two documents. Certain content aspects through which the Charter outperforms the Convention were identified: the rights, which modernise the Convention or extend its applicability.
Among other topics, the course tackled procedural aspects specific for the European Court of Human Rights and Court of Justice of the European Union, emphasizing the admission criteria before ECHR, as well as the interferences between the two legal systems.
The course also had an important practical component, the debates being concentrated on the commentary of the evolutionary aspects of the European case-law in the matter regarding the protection of human rights.