Monitoring the implementation of human rights education by national actors

Is human rights education provided for in the education laws and policies in your country? Are teachers trained to build a human rights-based culture of respect in the classrooms? Do the school curricula include elements on human rights?

In many countries, monitoring data on the actual level of implementation of human rights education is poor or non-existent. The Danish Institute for Human Rights (DIHR), with the support and technical expertise of the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR), has embarked on a multi-stakeholder process of recommending a human rights education indicators framework. Potential elements of that framework recently went through pilot testing by national human rights institutions (NHRIs).

SevenNHRIs have tested prospective HRE indicators in their contexts and will share their experiences during the side event.

The pilot project also has an overarching view to assist and operationalise simultaneous data collection on the implementation of human rights education in the context of SDG 4.7 and the World Programme on Human Rights Education.

A powerful investment

“Human rights education is a powerful investment in the development of a strong human rights culture. Human rights education fosters sustainable development and the creation of more just societies based on equality and rule of law,” the Ambassador at the Permanent Mission of Denmark to the UN in Geneva, Morten Jespersen says.

According to the Methodology, Education and Training Section of OHCHR, the inclusion of human rights education in the Sustainable Development Agenda, as a specific target of SDG 4 on quality education, provides new impetus to national implementation of human rights education as well as to related efforts to measure progress through specific indicators.

The development of the human rights indicators framework is supported by the Permanent Mission of Denmark to UN in Geneva.