Pupils organise their own children's conference
Children and youth representatives: 17th children's conference planned for 25 September
Last Monday, numerous primary school pupils met for a special session at the town hall to vote on their topics for the 17th children's conference. Pupils from the Rosa Luxemburg primary school and the Obere Luisenschule primary school formed the on-site organisation team. Participants from Altchemnitz School, DPFA Rainbow Primary School, Charles Darwin Primary School and Heinrich Heine Primary School were connected online.
The pupils voted on a new format and selected this year's topics themselves in a child-friendly, democratic process. The central question was: Do we want to organise our children's conference ourselves? The team accepted the idea almost unanimously. The primary school children will now design their 17th primary school conference themselves on 25 September 2023.
This extraordinary meeting gave the children new and different tasks than the previous format. They want to decide by September whether they will organise this first fully democratic version of the children's conference entirely themselves or attend another workshop. What and how they want to experience the children's conference was up for debate. Initial suggestions for topics ranged from their own game for voting on rules, to rubbish collection campaigns in the districts of Bernsdorf and Schloßchemnitz, to the idea of "making the playground colourful".
The special session of the children's conference was implemented with the youth organisation team and school social work. This is supported by the City of Chemnitz's Children and Youth Officer, Ute Spindler, in cooperation with municipal institutions, pupils from primary schools and independent socio-cultural initiatives, commercial enterprises such as eins and ASR and associations such as the Chemnitz UNICEF working group.