My Story - News for and by teenagers. Preventing the recruitment of teenagers by illegal armed groups through participatory journalism in Colombia.

我的故事：青少年新闻是一项在线新闻服务，在哥伦比亚最暴力的地区之一推广以年轻人为基础的议程，许多18岁以下的人被迫或被引诱加入非法武装团体。该项目以人权委员会之前的一个项目为基础，该项目由前儿童兵与自2016年与哥伦比亚革命武装力量停火以来长大的年轻人合作，为哥伦比亚不再发生冲突提供了生动的证词和建议。这个新项目以创造性和积极的方式应用这些证词和建议，以培养弱势社区以及地方当局和活动人士对我们研究的深入参与。通过让有可能被非法招募的青少年参与这个报告项目，我们了解他们如何看待自己的生活、社区和未来，我们能够建立干预措施和宣传，防止他们加入武装团体。正如我们之前的研究表明，在战区长大的年轻人通常会感到无能为力、不满，无法获得基本必需品，也无法改善他们的生活环境。他们会觉得自己被困住了，被虐待了，而且经常会有一种深深的羞辱感。这可以产生强烈的权力欲望，从而恢复失去的尊严，重新获得个人效能感。加入武装团体还可以在身体、情感或经济不安全的情况下提供保护。因此，面对长期暴力的背景，哥伦比亚边缘地区的许多青少年可能会经历消极的身份认同，这破坏了动力和信心，也滋生了抑郁。这可能激起逃离的欲望和必要性，对许多年轻人来说，加入武装团体往往是唯一的解决办法。在这种背景下，我们的项目通过提供新闻和视听制作方面的正式培训，在被认为有被招募风险的青少年中建立自信和自我效能感，以激发反思和激发看待世界的新方式。这也培养了可转移的技能，提高了他们在创意经济中就业的潜力。通过具体的讲故事，这些年轻的记者将在前儿童兵的经历的指导下探索冲突的危险，以挑战他们作为战斗人员的生活有时被美化的看法。该项目将通过提出避免冲突再次发生的建议、激发社区间的辩论和讨论，以及鼓励年轻记者通过呼吁和发现积极变化来质疑周围环境，从而创建一种培养韧性和支持和平建设的新闻业。通过在学校举办点对点研讨会来推广这个项目，我们的年轻记者也成为了他们的朋友、同学和社区的和平倡导者。在网路上发表的故事，将会附有问题、活动和讨论主题，为学校和青少年服务机构在更广泛的社区和其他边缘化环境中，创造一个工具，让他们使用我们的材料来建立复原力。在项目结束时，一个基于网站及其内容的教育和宣传工具包将由我们在该项目的主要合作伙伴救助儿童会在国家和国际层面实施预防招募战略。

My Story: News For and By Teenagers is an online news service promoting a youth-based agenda in one of Colombia's most violent regions, where many under 18s have been forced or enticed into joining illegal armed groups. It builds upon a previous AHRC project which produced animated testimony and recommendations for the non-repetition of conflict in Colombia by former child soldiers in partnership with young people who have grown up since the ceasefire with the FARC in 2016. This new project applies these testimonies and recommendations in a creative and active way to cultivate deep engagement with our research among vulnerable communities, as well as among local authorities and campaigners. By engaging teenagers at-risk of illicit recruitment in this reporting project, we identify how they see their lives, their communities and their futures, and we are able to build interventions and advocacy to prevent them from joining armed groups.As our previous research has shown, youngsters who grow up in war zones typically feel powerless, disaffected and unable to obtain basic necessities and improve their life circumstances. They can feel trapped and abused, and often experience a deep sense of humiliation. This can create a strong desire to achieve power so they can restore their lost dignity and regain a sense of personal efficacy. Joining an armed group can also offer protection in a context of physical, emotional or economic insecurity. Faced with contexts of protracted violence, many teenagers on the margins of Colombia can therefore experience negative identities, which destroy motivation and confidence, and also breed depression. This can instigate a desire and necessity for escape, and often joining an armed group can appear as the only solution to many young people.Against this backdrop, our project builds confidence and self-efficacy among teenagers considered at-risk of recruitment by providing formal training in journalism and audiovisual production to stimulate reflection and provoke new ways of seeing the world. This also develops transferable skills, which enhance their potential for employment within the creative economy. Through storytelling specifically, these young journalists will explore the dangers of conflict, guided by the experiences of former child soldiers, in order to challenge their sometimes glamourised perceptions of life as a combatant. The project will create a journalism that fosters resilience and supports peacebuilding through the promotion of recommendations for the non-repetition of conflict, provoking debate and discussion among the community, as well as a journalism that encourages the young reporters to question their surroundings by calling for and identifying positive change. Through additional peer-to-peer workshops in schools to promote the project, our young reporters also become peace advocates among their friends and fellow students, and in their neighbourhoods.The stories published online will be accompanied by questions, activities and themes for discussion, creating a tool for schools and youth services in the wider community and other contexts of marginalisation to use our material for resilience-building. At the end of the project, an educational and advocacy toolkit based on the website and its content will be implemented into recruitment prevention strategies at the national and international level by our key partner in this project, Save The Children.